


The TITANS

by snapfreeze



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: F/F, Modern AU, OCs everywhere, Other, ocs getting paired up with canon characters, ocs out of the wazoo, superhero au, we're so sorry
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-15
Updated: 2015-06-09
Packaged: 2018-01-19 12:07:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 71,384
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1469071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/snapfreeze/pseuds/snapfreeze
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If there's a villain tearing up your neighbourhood, who you gonna call? The TITANS! If it's something horrifying and it doesn't look good, who you gonna call? The TITANS! I ain't afraid of no villain! If you see civilians running away from a giant mythical creature, who can you call? The TITANS! Superhero AU/Modern AU prioritising the female and nonbinary characters, with OCs and a lot of interpretation. So, who are you gonna call?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Beginnings

**LABS 11-20, US ARMY RESEARCH LABORATORY, MARYLAND, 1456 HOURS, 7TH JULY 2011**

Dr. Hanji Zoe believed in everything: it was their job. To test, to hypothesise, to understand. Even when the odds were against them, even when it sounded too supernatural, it was their job to understand why. Though, it was going to take a lot more than hypothesising to fathom what was going to happen in upcoming years.

The clicking of footsteps echoed down the alabaster white hallways, signifying emptiness in spite of it being early afternoon. Despite the record breaking heatwave outside, the labs remained thankfully cool, allowing Hanji to wear a thin beige button down, formal grey trousers and practical knee high boots below their lab coat.

As they continued down the usual route to their lab, they encountered a pair of scientists chatting to each other, completely oblivious to the world. Hanji recognised them instantly: the two head scientists working on more protective ballistic vests without sacrificing mobility. Slowing down their pace, they began to eavesdrop on their conversation out of curiosity.

“Did you hear the topic that the bosses are fighting about?” The first scientist said, taking a sip out of her coffee before continuing. “Superpowers. Out of all things. Not western imperialism, not even civilian safety,  _superpowers_. Calling them defects out of all things. It’s all bullshit I tell you, just another internet myth gone wild.”

“I dunno, I heard the biology department is getting all up in arms about it. At least we’re not the poor assholes that have to test it.” The second scientist added.

“That’s true. This is real life, not a Marvel or DC comic. We’re here to test actual things not whether Wonder Woman’s magical lasso actually forces you to tell the truth or is just actually--”

Knowing that the conversation was no longer going to prove itself interesting, Hanji continued on their walk, eventually making it to their own lab. Pulling up their goggles to their forehead, they bent over slightly to allow the security system to scan their retinas.

“IDENTITY RECOGNISED,” the computerised voice began, “WELCOME BACK, DR. ZOE.”

The door hissed open to reveal a catastrophically messy lab. Stacks of papers that were so close to falling over covered every available horizontal surface, along with writing utensils that could have a better home. Machines whirred quietly as Hanji passed them.

Upon reaching one of the many filing cabinets, the scientist retrieved the appropriate file before quite forcibly shutting it again lest it’s contents spill out. As they perused the file while walking back to the counters, the package at their feet lifted up off the ground and followed them like a dog loyally following it’s owner. Hanji didn't seem to notice when the package plowed through a paper tower, through an intricately made pencil tower and haphazardly sat itself on the counter. It was only when Hanji perched themselves onto a stool did they notice the chaos they brought upon themselves instead of manually carrying the package: to right themselves, they simply stared at the mess, concentrating slightly to move the fallen paper back to it’s stack, and rebuilding the pencil tower structure.

Now satisfied with the mess levels back to normal, they delved back into their file.

With their hands occupied, Hanji began to telekinetically open the box, only glancing at the object every now and then to make sure that everything was on the right course. Hanji was pleased to see that the near-field scanning optical microscope had not been built before being delivered, presenting them with a challenge that could occupy them for the rest of the afternoon. They had just begun to assemble the first parts when the intercom buzzed loudly, interrupting Hanji’s train of thought.

”Dr. Zoe? The help you requested has arrived.”

Moving to the door, Hanji unlocked it, auburn eyes settling on a short ginger-haired woman in desert marine uniform, who instantly snapped into a salute. Hanji noticed the gleam of the Chevrons pinned to her collar and was impressed at how neat the woman looked despite the heat.

“Master Sergeant Petra Ral at your service, Doctor!” She barked, back straight, hazel eyes forward.

“And a pleasure to see you too!” Hanji replied, stepping in close to pull Petra’s hand down from the salute for a firm handshake. “I’m glad that an honoured sni--” Brilliantly rich reds flashed before Hanji’s eyes, followed by oranges and yellows of equal stature. Brief memories that were not their own succeeded, memories of turning invisible, memories of gunfire, memories of loss and of home, all invading Hanji’s mind in the brief moments of their palms touching. When the contact was ended, however, Hanji was greeted by the mildly worried and confused stare of the sergeant.

“Ah! Don’t worry, I just get lost in my own mind. So many things to think about today!”

Petra nodded slowly but was still looked slightly confused, so Hanji clapped their hands together and turned around to look for the reason Petra was here.

“Right, yes the scope is…” Hanji scanned the chaos that was their lab and furrowed their brow. “Ah, I may need to find it. Give me just a minute!” After upturning several piles and causing more chaos in the process, they turned back to the master sergeant. “Please do come in though! Find a seat, make yourself at home!”

Stepping into the room, Petra perched herself on the only available chair in the lab and unslung the heavy case from her shoulder, placing it upright between her knees.

“Is that your rifle?” Asks Hanji, still shuffling papers around and moving various boxes aside.

“A Barrett M82, Doctor--”

“Call me Hanji. No need for formalities here!”

“--Hanji. What is it that you needed me for today?”

“Spectacular question!” The doctor spins on their heel, facing Petra once again. “I requested your help to help me test a new piece of equipment. The Identify Friend-Foe scope for sniper rifles. IFF Scope for short. Highlights threats in red, noncombatants in white and friendlies in blue. Not only that, it can evaluate the danger of the person! And when your scope is pointed at a marked friendly, you cannot fire! So with this scope, friendly fire may very well cease to exist. On top of that, it has in built night vision and thermal settings to use as you wish. It also has an inbuilt recording system that records what you’re doing so if you purposely do anything dodgy with my equipment, we’re going to know about it. Basically a miniature computer in your scope! Isn’t science fantastic!”

Just as Petra was about to open her mouth, Hanji let out a victorious _a-ha_ , raising an object in their hand.

“Found it!” Hanji exclaimed triumphantly. “Although in hindsight, I should’ve found it earlier because I would be in huge trouble for misplacing the only IFF scope in existence.”

Flipping the scope once in the air, they passed it over, along with the file they were reading earlier.

“As you can probably feel, the IFF slightly heavier than your own scope, as we had to fit the circuitry and processor in with the usual materials. It’s entirely waterproof, and shockproof, though I don’t know why you’d be hitting people with your $12,000 rifle. Or be using your scope as a projectile.” Hanji paused, seemingly lost in thought: Petra thought best to let Hanji do most of the talking. Mainly because she enjoyed the way Hanji can go on about their work, clearly in love with it, and because she’d struggle to get a word in sideways.

Petra only needed to wait a few more moments before Hanji snapped back out of their thoughts and shot her an apologetic look. “Sorry about that. I just had an absolutely _magnificent_ new idea.”

Petra gave Hanji a small smile. “It doesn’t have anything to do with weaponised sniper scope projectiles, does it?”

Hanji laughed, eyes twinkling with mirth. “No, nothing like that. Not yet, anyway. Would you like some time to read the file here or should we just go to the range and run through it there?"

“I can read it while we walk to the range and run through it again when we get there.” Petra replied, getting up off the stool and slinging her rifle case back over her shoulder.

“Of course!” Hanji said, obviously excited. “Follow me!” Picking up their laptop and a pair of binoculars, they re-opened the door, letting Petra pass through before relocking it.

As they walked in silence, Hanji found their mind constantly wandering and brushing against Petra’s. They started to use their free hand to fiddle with the lapels of their lab coat to focus and was perplexed as to why this was happening. Hanji wasn’t overloading; there was no reason for their mind to roam like this. Petra’s mind was new but even from that brief moment of contact, Hanji could sense an abundance of strength and a fierce protectiveness, but also a kindness and gentleness that left a sweet aftertaste in their mouth.

It was almost calming for Hanji, Petra’s mind made them feel peaceful, content and warm. Something about Petra made them almost want to submerge themselves in her consciousness. Hanji had felt something in that brief moment. There was something special about this woman, and it wasn’t only because she had powers like them.

Thanks to the weather, the outside firing range was open, and Hanji was able to secure a spot for the afternoon. After passing through security, they stepped into the range and were greeted by blistering sunshine. The outdoor range was much larger than the indoor one: half a mile in length, and a quarter of a mile in width, this range was the prime location for testing things that required sniper rifles. At the end of the range in front of a steep hillside sat a plethora of targets. They moved to stand under the range’s thin shelter, acquiring the innermost table. As Hanji set up their laptop, Petra went about reconstructing her rifle; it wasn’t long until the Barrett M82 was fully constructed, and Petra was awaiting permission to load rounds into the rifle.

“Before we start, Petra, I’m just going to rehash what we’re going to do first. We’re just aiming to calibrate your aim and your scopes right now, so there are five targets down the bottom of the range. Hit them as best as you can with the scope you have right now so we have a baseline, and we’ll repeat this three times so we definitely have an average score. Then, we’ll put on the IFF scope, and do the same again, and compare results! It’s going to be an exciting test!”

Hanji then promptly, somehow, managed to slide a pair of safety glasses over their seeing goggles, and then a pair of ear defenders: Petra did the same, carefully loading five .50 BMG rounds into their clip and slotting said clip into the gun.

Glancing to her left, Petra saw Hanji give her an encouraging thumbs up. Returning a smile, she sighted down the scope, only squeezing the trigger when she was sure she’d hit the heart of the target. Four more sharp cracks ensued, the recoil of the gun never causing Petra to flinch; she never felt it anymore. As the last target was ensnared in a billowing pile of dust from the bullet hitting the hillside, she flicked the gun to safety, removing the ear defenders.

“Let’s see what you got!” Hanji started, removing their own ear defenders and looking through the binoculars. “Eight. Nine. Ten. Ten. Nine. A total of 46 of 50. That’s incredible!” They began to type down the results onto their laptop.

“I can do much better,” Petra simply replied, “that was just me warming up.”

“Well, you have plenty of room to show off.”

Petra smirked. “I intend to.”

With a wide grin, Hanji said, “fantastic! Start standard scope baseline test two whenever you’re ready!”

Test two gave Petra a better score, this time scoring 48 out of 50, and test three proved even better when she scored 49 of 50. Hanji was amazed with her sharpshooting skills, pleased that they got the right person for the job.

Seemingly pleased with the average score of 47, Petra began to disassemble their rifle to change the standard scope to the prototype IFF scope.

“If you don’t mind my asking -- what is the point in this particular test? Surely you want to test the technology which is clearly what we’re not doing because we’re testing whether or not I can hit a target.”

“Once again, a spectacular question!” Hanji put their binoculars down on the table, turning to Petra. “Because we want to make sure we’re actually hitting the target. This scope has never been properly used on a live rifle before, and the last time we went straight into testing without calibrating and making sure the scope saw straight produced horrifyingly interesting results. I can pull up the results of that particular test on my laptop if you want!”

The confusion was wiped off Petra’s face quickly with that answer, almost as quick as her head shake in response to the proposal. “No thank you. I appreciate the offer Doc-- Hanji, but I’d prefer to keep the nightmares to a minimum this week.”

“I thoroughly agree with you, after that test we were finding stray bullets and dummy parts for days.” Hanji’s mind wandered off like earlier once again, and once again, Petra saw fit not to interrupt whatever their thought process was. “Nonetheless! Shall we test out this beautiful thing?”

Nodding, Petra returned to their station, making sure that the scope was balanced on their rifle before loading the rounds again.

“IFF scope, calibration test, test one. Whenever you’re ready, Petra.”

Remembering the story of the test of the last scope, Petra was briefly and mildly terrified that the scope was going to backfire on her, but swallowed the fear down in the name of Hanji’s science. She was a marine, after all. Sighting down the new scope, she took more time to adjust to the new part, before squeezing the trigger. Without even sparing a glance of whether she even hit the target or not, she moved onto the next, and then onto the next in an alarmingly calm manner for someone using a gun that was 14kg in weight and had a muzzle velocity of 853 meters per second. Hanji unabashedly admired this.

“Fantastic work, Petra! I can see a -- wow! Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Nine! 49 of 50 on the first go, that’s astounding _and_ promising!” Petra could feel the enthusiasm rolling off Hanji. “Start test two whenever you’re ready, because I certainly am.”

Test two produced the same result, a 49 of 50, but test three was the one that caused Hanji to check the targets through the binoculars multiple times. It was on the fourth check did Hanji finally speak up. “Did you just -- you scored 50 of 50. A perfect score.” Brown eyes met Petra’s, before Hanji, unexpectedly, did a victory jump and called out a loud _yahoo!_

“You fantastic human being, Petra!” Added the scientist, clapping Petra on the back once, this time refraining from any direct touch to skin.

“I tried my best.”

“With an average of 49 for the IFF scope, you did more than try. You knocked it right out the ballpark!”

“Like I said, I tried. I have a feeling that this isn’t the end of the scope test. Would I be right on this assumption?”

“You would be correct! For the next part we’re moving to the indoor firing range to test out the technology on some dummies, for we might get arrested if we tried out the scope on any sentient being. It’s not far, just across the way from the security entrance.”

With that, Hanji shut their laptop, and waited for Petra to sling their rifle back over her shoulder before walking away. It was a shame they were going inside, but Hanji thought it was thoroughly worth it for they were doing it in the name of science.

It wasn’t long before they were standing at the bottom end of the range, their only light coming from the incredibly bright lightbulb above them.

“Part two of the testing is testing out the technology, as we stated before. The range is going to be in complete darkness not to just test out the night vision technology, but the IFF technology itself. The deal here is a misunderstood white man walked into an airport and started unleashing a hail of bullets upon everything that moved. The lights were shortly cut out, and you were brought in to end the situation. There are several officers in the building with the shooter, attempting to evacuate civilians and returning fire. Your goal here is to take down the shooter without causing civilian or friendly casualties. We don’t know what the shooter looks like apart from being a white male, and we don’t know what type of guns he’s using. First, you’ll be using your standard scope. Replace the scope, set yourself up, and fire any questions at me before we turn out the light above us.” Hanji paused briefly, before realising that they forgot to mention something. “Oh! Like last time, we’ll be doing this three times, the dummies changing positions and who they are every time. They also change weapons.”

“Is there anything you can tell me about the layout of the airport?”

“Nope. I’ve never been here before, and we’re trying to gain access into the floor plans but it is a slow process. You’re going in blind.”

“Of course.” Petra leaned in to the rifle, signifying that she was ready.

“Technology baseline one, standard scope.” The light bulb flickered off.

Unsurprisingly, Petra couldn’t see a thing down the range, only slight outlines of dummies and nothing that could solidify that they were the shooter: she knew that she’d do better in baseline two or three, since her eyes would’ve adjusted to the dark by then.

A full minute passed before Petra’s sights rested on a dummy that looked vaguely threatening, holding a gun that certainly didn’t look like the standard 9mm pistol. Since the rest of the dummies looked unarmed, or seemed to be holding a 9mm, she took the shot, the gunshot echoing around the room. All the lights flickered on shortly afterwards, nearly blinding Petra briefly.

“Congratulations!” Hanji began, letting the binoculars drop, now hanging around their neck. “You got the bad guy! There’s a nice neat hole in his head now. How did you know it was him?”

“His stance was off, firing like a civilian, not like a professional. And the whole AK-47 thing gave it away. I was struggling to make out the dummies though, since it was so dark.”

Hanji nodded, writing down all the relevant information in their laptop. “You managed to take down the bad guy at a solid 1 minute and 7 seconds, which is a fantastic time on it’s own!” They typed down more information. “Unfortunately, now we have to stand around in the lobby while some of the interns change around the dummies. It shouldn’t take long.”

Half an hour passed, and the baseline tests were done. Test two was the slowest, with Petra completing it in 1 minute 10 seconds. Test three, however, was the fastest by a margin, with the completion time being 1 minute 6 seconds. A firm average of 1 minute 8 seconds. Hanji was visibly pleased by these results, as seen in the constant compliments of Petra’s accuracy and skills.

“Here comes the fun part! Technology test one, IFF scope. You now have night vision equipped on your scope, and dummies now have identifiers on them. Friendlies are going to be highlighted in blue, and the shooter in red. Of course, we are going to adapt the technology for those who are colour blind as soon as possible because accessibility is really important and we should always prioritise accessibility!” Taking a deep breath, Hanji continued. “Regardless, on your mark.”

Petra sighted down the scope once again.

“Mark.”

The light bulb flickered off.

The scope coloured what Petra was seeing in various shades of greens, noncombatants highlighted in white, and officers had a blue aura about them. If she hovered over an officer for a second, details about the weapon they were holding appeared on the right of the scope, and Petra was nothing short of impressed. Soon enough, a dummy that was painted vivid red came across her sights, this time holding a Brügger & Thomet MP-9: she took the shot.

“45 seconds!” Exclaimed Hanji, jumping out of their seat. “Your best time today by a _mile_. This is promising for the scope!”

“It definitely helped,” Petra said, “not only could I see where I was pointing my rifle at, I could discern who was a threat and who wasn’t, and I could see what weapons they were using and a short description of said weapon would appear on the right of the scope. I’m really impressed.”

“Coming from you, that’s an incredible compliment. I knew it was a brilliant idea bringing you in!”

Petra had to give the scientist a smile at that, for they had been nothing but polite and enthusiastic for her entire visit so far. She made a mental note to work with Dr. Zoe whenever possible.

Tests two and three went just as well, test two with an improvement of 39 seconds, and test three - now that Petra had adjusted to the technology - was the quickest at 33 seconds. With an average of 39 seconds, a 29 second improvement, it proved promising for IFF technology in general.

“Absolutely fantastic!” Hanji was brimming with excitement. “The difference between the baseline and this test is incredible! Nearly a full 30 seconds! This is just incredible!” They were typing furiously into their laptop as Petra disassembled their rifle: she made sure to remove the IFF scope and replace it with her standard one before packing it up completely. From the way Hanji was acting, she knew she did a good job.

Now, they were standing by Petra’s car, the shorter woman carefully packing her rifle case into the boot of the car. Despite it being late afternoon turning into evening, the sun was still out and shining, the heat not letting up. Hanji was almost sad that they were going to say their goodbyes, but they had a gut feeling they’d be seeing her again.

“Thank you again for helping, you have been invaluable.” The scientist started, appreciation visible in their eyes. “If we need more help on the IFF scope, or anything regarding snipers, I’ll definitely give you a call.”

“No, thank _you_ ,” Petra said, reaching forward for a handshake, “this has been a great experience. It’s nice to do something that isn’t particularly life endangering.”

Taking Petra’s hand, they gave it a firm shake, really feeling the tight grip of the woman. They also felt a sense of something new; something developing within Petra; something that was high risk but high reward.

When they pulled their hand away, they had to stretch the muscles for Petra had a strong grip: they also made a mental note to keep gum in their pocket in case skin contact was needed in the future, for some may consider it rude if they knew Hanji was reading their mind.

“Where are you off to now? Back to base?”

“Surprisingly, no. I’m off to see an old squadmate of mine, she’s offered me a bed to sleep in before I head back to Quantico. Been assigned to teach the new sniper recruits so that will be an interesting endeavour. Anyway. Thank you again.”

“It was my pleasure,” Hanji moved to open up the driver’s side door, Petra snapping into another salute before climbing in.

It wasn’t until Petra’s car was over the horizon did Hanji move back towards their lab.

**ONE WEEK LATER**

**LAB 14, US ARMY RESEARCH LABORATORY, MARYLAND, 2100 HOURS**

A machine was beeping incessantly, trying to tell its owner that its task was done but Hanji was oblivious to the noise. The unfinished prototype sketches for a new type of fireproof material remained untouched and Hanji was staring off into space, lost in their own thoughts.

Ever since they had overheard that conversation between the two scientists and meeting Petra, Hanji couldn't seem to focus entirely on their work. Their mind now constantly wandered off into the great unknown part of science that was superpowers. Hanji knew that superpowers existed; they were living proof of that. But the world knew next to nothing about them: the world thought powers were just entirely fictitious. Where did the powers come from? What kind of mutation is it? How is it caused? Who is most likely to develop powers? What are the factors that contribute to what type of powers a person gets? Did it make a person more susceptible to disease? Were there different levels of powers? Was it entirely genetic or environmental or a mix of both? What caused powers to manifest? So many questions whirled around in Hanji’s head and they sighed, unwrapping two sticks of gum and starting to chew on them.

Superpowers were going to be revealed sooner or later. And when that time came, Hanji wanted to be prepared.

With that in mind, they reached for their mobile phone, not even pausing to think about what they were doing when they hit the call button.

“Master Sergeant Ral? Dr. Zoe here, but enough of the formalities. I have a proposition for you.”


	2. Coworkers

**BROOKLYN HEIGHTS, NEW YORK CITY, 1745 HOURS, 4TH AUGUST 2011**

“So basically,” Petra started, “you read my mind completely accidentally and that’s how you knew I had powers.”

“Yep.” Hanji simply replied. “I feel like I should apologise for it, so, I’m sorry.”

“At least I know now.”

They fell into a silence, snow continuing to fall around them. They were currently standing on the back steps of a brownstone house that Hanji inherited from their aunt, and it was one of the fanciest buildings Petra had ever stood in despite the mess and general lack of attention it had received over the years.

“Being ex-military is weird.” Petra started again. “I have no job obligations any more. And I still can’t believe I said yes to your job offer.”

“What? It was a fantastic idea! We’re the first to do it, we’ll be the only ones to have it, and we’ll be doing some fantastic things in the name of science, or whatever one’s personal motivation is.” Hanji pouted slightly. “It’s not a bad thing that you said yes to my proposition.”

Moving closer to Hanji, she laid a hand on their forearm reassuringly. “And I didn’t mean it negatively. Without context, this job is quite… well, ludicrous.” Petra paused briefly, thinking about something that was causing conflict within her.

“What is it? You know I can quite easily read your mind to find out so you might as well tell me.” Hanji teased.

“It’s just -- I discovered I had a new power. Shortly after I met you, actually. And this is going to sound _really_ silly but I see things now. In the future. I look like I’m having a fit, an epileptic fit, and then I pass out, I see something and then I wake up.”

“You have foresight?”

“Yes.”

The ex-scientist let out a tremendous _yahoo!_ while jumping, this being the second time Petra seeing Hanji doing something like this.

“This is incredible! Absolutely fantastic! You can see into the future! What did you see?” Hanji bounded closer to Petra, leaning in quite closely.

Petra, undeterred, continued. “I saw many things. Some things I couldn’t remember, or make out, but I remember seeing us, not just _us_ , but so many other people doing amazing things. Like a team.”

“This is fantastic! Powers are proving themselves that they are not just offensive, they are universal! Thank you for telling me Petra!” Hanji wrapped the shorter woman a tight hug, letting go a short while later.

“On the other hand, it gave me a really solid way to retire honourably from the military. Can’t exactly work in a live fire zone when you get frequent and severe epileptic fits. How did you get out?”

“I asked. When they asked why, I gave them a long speech but all I think they heard was the word autism and they promptly agreed with my resignation. Which is partly amusing and mostly sad.”

“They gave up their best scientist because of their bias, and now you’re all ours.” Petra added, reassuring Hanji once again.

“I know. Isn’t it great?” They shared a matching grin, before falling back into silence.

“Rico’s late,” Hanji observed five minutes later as they checked their watch.

Petra glanced up at the sky. It was getting darker and the snow was starting to fall more heavily. “Okay so, what exactly can Rico do?”

Hanji twisted their hands together and let out a breath. “Weapon proficiency and healing. Rico can pick up any weapon and instantly use it like she’s been trained to wield it her whole life. It’s amazing! I spent four whole hours one afternoon throwing various weapons at her and Rico was an expert in all of them. And don’t take her eye as an example of how well she can heal, that was foul play when that happened. I’ve seen her hand blown to pieces and then completely healed within hours. Which I should note was an accident. Sort of.”

Frowning, Petra opened her mouth to ask but was cut off by the sound of a truck slowly rolling into the alleyway. Hanji immediately perked up and bounded down the steps, skidding to a stop when the truck pulled up next to them. The truck gave one last splutter before the engine turned off and the door opened to reveal a person bundled up in layers of clothing. The person jumped out and held out her hand for Hanji.

“Sorry I’m late,” she apologised, “truck didn’t want to start because of this cold.”

Hanji shook the proffered hand and clapped Rico on the shoulder. “It’s great to see you again after all this time! I’m glad that you accepted my request.”

“Nowadays I’m just floating around and accepting any job that looks good. It’ll be nice to finally do something useful with these powers without someone taking a look at my eye and refusing to hire me.” Rico said, rubbing her hands together.

The three of them stood in silence for a few moments before Hanji perked up.

“Oh, right. Introductions. Yes!” Turning to Petra, they swept their arm out in Petra’s direction. “Petra, this is Rico. Rico, this is Petra. She’s an ex-marine. You’re going to get to know each other very well soon.”

"Ex-marine you say? Officer Rico Brzenska. Ex-SWAT. Ex-Bomb Squad. I now consider myself freelance."

Rico turned so that she was fully facing Petra, and Petra had to suppress the urge to stare. Rico’s left eye was completely white, and there was a thick, peculiar, almost knot like scar running from top to bottom. The surrounding skin was red, puckered and scarred, almost as if the skin had bubbled before healing.

“Pleasure to meet you, Petra. I’ve heard a lot about you from Hanji. And don’t worry about staring, I’m used to it now.”

“Oh. Sorry, anyway.” Petra swallowed a little, really recognising the fact that Rico had quite an intimidating aura about them. “Pleasure to meet you too, Rico.”

“I know Hanji uses they/them pronouns, so while I remember, do you have any specific pronouns?”

“Oh! No. I’m cisgender, so just she/her pronouns. What about you?”

“Agender, actually. She/they, my name, any works. Thank you for asking.”

“Did you really need a truck to move your stuff?” Hanji asks out of the blue, eyeing up the size of the vehicle. It was certainly large, and it looked like overkill for transporting belongings for just one person.

“Just wait until you see what’s in here.” Rico grinned and walked towards the back of the truck, motioning for them to follow. She then threw open the tailgate and Petra and Hanji could only stare at the contents.

“That’s… a lot of weapons.”

There seemed to be an entire armoury in the truck. Racks full of shotguns, swords, staves and assault rifles lined the walls of the container and there were crates of pistols, submachine guns and ammunition stacked high. Petra thought she even spied more than a few rocket launchers and a small mounted machine gun and tucked away in the corner.

Rico broke the silence after a few moments of watching them amusedly. “Still got the sniper rifles and a few more ammo crates to transport because they didn’t fit. I’ll have to unload this lot then go back for them.”

Petra was the first to talk, eyes still wide at the crates. “God forbid you get flagged down by a patrolling police car.”

Hanji, who was still staring at the truck with a slightly open mouth, snapped out of their thoughts and rubbed the back of their neck. "Wow. Uh. We didn't exactly prepare for this. I didn't know you'd bring a whole entire armoury with you, Rico. We only have this place ready. We don't even have a tech type person yet."

Rico cocked her head to the side and a thoughtful expression passed over her face. "I can help you there. I know a tech type person who can help us, definitely.  And she may have a large hideout or two up her sleeves. She's been looking for a new job for quite a while, let me see if I can ring her to see if she's interested." Slamming the truck's door down, she promptly rounded the vehicle, climbing back into the van to make the call.

The snow fell heavier than before, and Petra began to wonder if a blizzard was upon them: she was internally wishing that they could go inside their small safehouse soon, lest the onset of hypothermia began. And it wasn’t exactly encouraging that nearly everywhere she looked, all she could see was a flurry of white.

Thankfully, Petra and Hanji only had to wait a few minutes before Rico jogged back over to them. “Her name is Zara Smith. No powers, but she’s an absolute genius with anything to do with tech and she agreed to join us without much persuasion. She’s catching a flight from Jamaica in a few days so I’ll be picking her up from JFK around then.”

“Are you sure she’s trustworthy?”

“She worked for MI6 for three years. She loved it there but when defects, as they so lovingly call us, started to appear and MI6 started to find those defect hideouts, she refused to participate and even went as far as to sabotage several raid missions into those hideouts.”

Petra made a noise of approval. “Bet her superiors weren’t too happy about that.”

Rico gave a small laugh. “No, they weren’t. They fired her but I think I recall her telling me that she did something to their system that would sabotage any future defect raids. And she rigged her work computer to release a few zettabytes of porn into the central servers when they try to comb through it for curing said sabotage.”

Petra was perplexed. “Zettabyte? I’ve heard of a terabyte but not a zettabyte.”

“A zettabyte is 1 billion terabytes.” Hanji answered. “And the internet as a whole is worth around 4 zettabytes, so Zara managing to flood MI6’s central servers with half an internet of porn is incredible!”

“She _is_ incredible. And slightly paranoid.” Rico pulled up the truck’s tailgate again, pulling one of the crates close so they could carry it. “Always hunting down and talking about conspiracy theories. The one she’s cracking down on right now is Area 50. Not Area 51, but Area 50. Area 51 has all the vanilla stuff, she says, and Area 50 is where all the more interesting stuff is. Just don’t ask her about it.” When Hanji and Petra didn’t make a move, she gestured towards the back of the truck with the crate they were holding in their arms. “What, you don’t think I’m going to take all this in by myself, do you? I still need to take a second trip just to get the remaining crates!”

**JFK AIRPORT, NEW YORK CITY, 0746 HOURS, 8TH AUGUST 2011**

It had been four days since Rico had arrived at the brownstone with enough weapons to equip several SWAT squads, and now they were standing in JFK’s arrivals lounge, waiting for Zara to land from her flight from Jamaica: she was already two hours late due to maintenance issues with the plane, and Rico wasn’t particularly happy about that. Staring at her eye had been at a minimum so far, thanks to the early hour.

Glancing at the arrival board, Rico was relieved to see that Zara’s flight status had finally changed to “LANDED”. Pushing off from the wall they were leaning on, she began to walk towards the correct terminal and waited a further half an hour until a wave of tourists came pouring out, considerably more tanned than they probably were before going to Jamaica. Even when the wave had thinned out, Rico still couldn’t see Zara.

“Hail up!” Rico turned towards the source of the voice, knowing that only one person with a thick Jamaican accent like that would only greet them and would try to sneak up on them that way. Standing in front of Rico was Zara, who was much taller than her and a hell of a lot more curvier. Her mass of dreadlocks were somewhat covered up by a grey beanie, but what caught her eye was not the lack of layers Zara was wearing but the huge grin she was wearing on her face.

“Long time no see, Zara.” Rico offered out her hand.

Zara ignored Rico’s outstretched hand in favour of pulling her into a tight hug. Rico grinned and hugged back equally tightly, only separating when Zara saw that people were trying to get past them.

“Weh yuh a seh?” Rico furrowed her brows in confusion and Zara caught on instantly. “Sorry, still speaking Jamaican. How are you?”

“I’m good. How was the flight?”

“Nearly four whole hours without internet, Rico. How did you think it went?”

“Ah.” Rico glanced at Zara’s trolley of luggage. “I assume that we’re going somewhere else to pick up your equipment?”

Zara nodded. “I pulled a favour and got a friend of mine to bring it here on a cargo plane. We can’t pick them up here without attracting some attention so he’s dropped them off somewhere else.” She looked behind her to check the time on an arrival board. “He should be there with my stuff now, actually.”

“And you plan to walk around New York with a grand total of two layers?” Crossing her arms, Rico gave Zara a once over to prove her point.

“I lived in England for nearly five years, I’ll be fine. And I know you brought another jacket just in case I dressed inappropriately, I know what you’re like.”

“And I know what _you’re_ like.” Rico retorted. “If all this luggage is not your equipment, then what on Earth is it?”   

“Well one of the cases is just my entire collection of novelty socks.” Rico opened her mouth, but was shortly interrupted. “I am not shitting you.”

Putting her hands up in a sign of surrender, Rico quickly moved to pick up two of the suitcases and slung another over her back so Zara could wheel the rest of them out of the airport without the danger of them all toppling off the cart. Zara immediately yanked the spare jacket from Rico as soon as they stepped outside and wrapped it around herself, pointedly ignoring Rico’s smug expression.

“I had to park the truck outside the airport because trying to manoeuvre a truck in this would not be fun for anyone.” Rico nodded her head at long line of cars attempting to get out of the airport.

“Please tell me it’s not too far away.” Zara shivered as another gust of icy wind blew through the carpark.  

“Five minutes if we walk quickly.”

Zara instantly picked up the pace and Rico had to break into a jog to keep up with her long strides. With their quickened pace, they reached the truck in no time and after hauling all of Zara’s luggage into the back of the truck, they hopped into the cab of the truck and went on their way.

“Where are we going again?” Rico asked, realising that Zara hadn’t told her where her equipment is being held.

“Brooklyn Navy Yard. I have the shipping container’s number and location in the yard.”

Rico glanced at the time on the dashboard. “Well, if the traffic hasn’t calmed down then we should be there in around forty minutes.”

With that information, Zara promptly stuck in her earbuds, flicking her iPod on: it wasn’t long before they were stuck back into traffic again, and Zara had taken up singing whatever was playing on her iPod as entertainment.

“ _I tip on alligators, and little rattle snakers, but I’m another flavour something like a terminator, ain’t no equivocating, I fight for what I believe, why you talkin’ about it, she’s talkin’ about it, some calling me a sinner, some calling me a winner, I’m calling you to dinner, and you know exactly what I mean, yeah I’m talking about you, you can rock or you can leave, watch me tip without you!_ ”

Rico had to smile at the sight of Zara dancing in her seat, and managed to survive through the times where Zara tried to get Rico to join in with the singing.

Eventually, they finally arrived at the shipping yard, gaining permission to drive the truck up to Zara’s container.

Outside the rusted maroon container stood a black man who was incredibly large in stature. Before Rico could question why, Zara had hopped out the cab and began exchanging words with him. A minute passed, and they shook hands, Zara stepping away to allow the man to pick up a pair of bolt cutters.

The man unlocked the shipping container and Zara practically skipped in to inspect her equipment. Rico squinted and followed suit, letting her eye adjust to the dark. Zara turned and stretched her arms out.

“Rico, meet my children.”

Rico glanced at the misshapen black lumps. “They’re beautiful, Zara.”

With a flourish, Zara swept the coverings off her equipment and began to inspect them. Rico leaned against a wall, watching as Zara ran her hands over her equipment and hummed to herself. It wasn’t until her hand ran over a large computer tower did she stop, eyes nearly popping out of her skull when she inspected the piece of equipment.

“They scratched Kimberly!” She gathered the tower up in her arms and began to inspect every inch of the device.

“You name your computers?”

“Yes, they work hard and they deserve to be named and looked after. They’re good computers.”

“They’re… computers. They don’t need names.”

Zara gently set Kimberly down, and turned to Rico, her voice calm. “Say that to my face again and I’ll release every bit of information about you onto the internet. Free to download.”

Once again, Rico put her hands up in surrender, picking up the nearest crate of what looked like wires near them. “I’ll start loading things _carefully_ into the truck. Come help when you’re ready, so we can get back into the warmth of brownstone quicker.”

At the idea of sitting in a warm house, Zara sprang to her feet and began to help Rico load her equipment into the truck. As soon as they were able, they sped off, eagerly anticipating the brownstone’s warmth.

Thanks to the traffic and the weather, it took them a full half an hour before the truck spluttered into the alleyway behind the brownstone. Zara, not even waiting for Rico to turn off the engine, hopped out and retrieved her laptop and it’s cables from the back of the truck. Before she had a chance to knock on the door, it swung open, revealing Hanji in nothing but a t-shirt and a pair of shorts.

“You must be Zara Smith! A pleasure to meet you! Do come in!” They pulled the door open further, allowing Zara entrance. Rico followed her in shortly afterwards, shaking herself off and slamming the door short.

“I’m Hanji. I would shake your hand but I don’t want to invade your mind’s personal space. It’s a slight problem when you’re telepathic. Also they/them pronouns please!”

“Pleasure to meet you too, Hanji,” Zara pulled off her coat, letting it hang on the nearby peg. “And my pronouns change on the daily. The joy of being genderfluid.”

Behind Hanji emerged a more sensibly dressed Petra, who was wearing what looked like one of Hanji’s jumpers, who offered out her hand. “Petra. I’ll shake your hand on behalf of Hanji. We’ve heard a lot of great things about you.”

Zara instantly took the hand and shook it, and shortly raised a brow at Petra’s accent. “Is that a hint of an English accent I hear?”

“You’d be correct,” Petra started, “born in Gloucester, lived there a few years before I moved here with my dad. I didn’t predict that I’d manage to keep a bit of the accent. You?”

“I moved to England to study at the University of Leicester. Maths and computing, if you couldn’t tell by my last job.”

“Rico also told us about your little parting gift for the MI6.” Hanji added.

Zara grinned wolfishly. “That was nothing. You should’ve seen what I gifted MI6 when I tried to get in.”

At Petra’s mildly horrified stare, and Hanji’s intrigue, Zara laughed, walking by them both to enter the front room. Rico shared a glance with Petra, one that said “I told you she was amazing.” Rico tried to glance at Hanji, but they kept on turning away. They all eventually followed Zara into the front room. Rico was pleased to see there was a fire in the fireplace, but its warmth did not permeate as much of the room as she would have liked.

The radiator whistled incessantly but after a few solid hits, it finally started to work. Rico sighed with relief and rubbed her hands together, cursing the increasingly cold weather. The four of them were not brave enough to face the weather again so Hanji was making tea, toast, bacon and eggs over the crackling fireplace while they waited for Zara to set up her laptop.

Padding over quietly over to the couch, she sat down heavily next to Petra, who was scrolling through a news feed on Hanji’s iPad. The room was finally warming up and the smell of bacon and eggs cooking was really starting to make Rico's mouth water.

Thankfully, it wasn’t long until Hanji placed a plate of steaming food on her lap and Zara was ready to start.

“Right, so we can use either an abandoned military base or a big underground bunker.” Zara’s fingers flashed across the keyboard and pulled up two images. She swung her legs up to rest on an ammunition crate and speared a piece of bacon on her fork before continuing.

“The bunker,” she explained as she pointed at the image on the right with her fork, “is fully underground and it’s pretty hard to find unless you know where to look. But I’ve been in there, and even with just the amount of equipment between Rico and I, we probably won’t be able to fit more than ten or so people in there without getting really cramped. Plus, we won’t get to train in there because I really don’t want to risk a cave-in.”

All three of them nodded in understanding. “And the military base?” Hanji asked.

Zara swallowed her mouthful of bacon and rubbed her forehead. “It’s a tiny military base but for our purposes and the amount of stuff that we have now, we can fit around twenty people or so in there with no problems.” She tapped a button twice and a set of floor plans came up. “Plus, there’s a pretty big garage, a courtyard, barracks, a mess hall, plenty of space to train and relax indoors and a set of underground tunnels. It just would take a little bit more work for me to make sure no one from the military comes knocking on our door one day to ask why we’re using it.”

Hanji turned slightly to face Petra and Rico. “I think the base sounds like it’ll suit our needs better.”

All of them nodded in agreement and Zara clapped her hands together, swinging her feet off the boxes and reaching for her phone. “I’ll get started then.” She glanced at her unfinished food. “After I finish this. If it all goes smoothly then we’ll be good to go by tomorrow.”

**MILITARY BASE, NEW YORK CITY, 0758 HOURS, 9TH AUGUST 2011**

Zara stood in front of the military base’s gates, eyes looking away briefly to take in the size of what they were doing. She was also glad that the snow had been reduced to a snow shower.

“I can’t believe that this is actually happening. We are actually building a superhero team. Like the Justice League but less ridiculous.” She looked back to her laptop. “But, unfortunately, none of us are millionaires so we need a building montage or something for the amount of work we need to do.”

“What _do_ we need to do?” Rico inquired.

“A lot of things. I have the list right here.” They clicked on a notepad tab, which was teeming with text. “We should move all the crates to start with. Then we have to fix the generators, the back up generators, fix the gas pipes, fix the heating, check the water supply, check the electricity and clean every room on the base of dust and cobwebs or whatever has formed in there.”

“That’s it?” Petra asked.

“No. Then, for the underground part we are going to install a training room, my cave and your armoury and medbay in the bunker. Hanji’s lab can go into any of the above ground buildings. Then we need to install any security systems you will allow me to put in. And then we need to decorate, fill it with furniture so we’re not squatting in some damp bedrooms and make it actually nice to live in.” Zara double checked the list she was looking at. “And that’s about it really.”

Hanji was silent for a few moments. “How many trips to Ikea is that?”

Petra looked at the list over Zara’s shoulder and rubbed her forehead. “More importantly, where are we going to get the money for this?”

“So you know all those asshole governors and other assholes in positions of power that sit on a pile of green and do jack shit with it other than collect more green? They’re going to be kindly donating a couple hundred grand every once in a while to a charity. That, and I’m sure I can set up a few sponsors here and there.” Zara shrugged. “It’s easy to do. Bank accounts are not as secure as you think.”

Everyone fell silent for a couple of moments: they were all kind of astonished over the fact that Zara would downright be stealing money from strangers.

Zara knew what they were thinking and continued talking. “It’s not like they were going to do anything with that money anyway. Except probably shit on some people, especially if they’re right wing.”

“I’d like to take this time to say that we’re really glad that you’re on our side, Zara.” Petra said. “But, going back to the original topic, where do we start?”

“If we focus on fixing the generators and gas, water, heating and electricity supplies and work on cleaning the rooms we’re going to use, we’ll be able to empty up the trucks and start properly moving in and installing security systems and other rooms. If all goes well, we should be finished by night. We might have to sleep in the trucks if there’s not even one bed.”

“No time like the present then!” Hanji clapped their hands together.

**EIGHT HOURS LATER**

Petra had been cleaning non-stop since they had entered the base, and had managed to clear up what was designated the recreation room, and the entirety of the barracks: she still had to clean the kitchen and the room where Hanji’s lab would be. Hanji had somehow managed to not only fix all the generators, but managed to fix the gas lines and water supply as well. If either Hanji or Petra looked out one of the windows, there would be a large pile of scrap that would soon be recycled or destroyed.

Zara and Rico, on the other hand, had managed to clean out the entirety of the bunker and had managed to fix the electricity supply. They were proud of what they’ve managed to achieve in such a short space of time. Now, Hanji and Petra were sitting in the bunker, upon some of Zara’s crates that they brought in: Zara herself had disappeared to find the bathroom and showers and Rico had left the base entirely in search of a pizza takeaway restaurant.

“It’s a shame we can’t use brownstone as a base of operations. I inherited that place when my aunt died, it’s so nice and relaxing there. But at least we can still keep it, Zara agreed to keep it as a back up base if necessary.” Hanji moved from the crate they were sitting on to sit next to Petra. “We still have so much to do though. When we tidy up this base, we’re going to need equipment and outfits built specifically around our powers and we are going to be the first people ever to study powers! And learn about powers and understand powers and it’s fantastic!”

Petra’s eyes briefly glanced at Hanji’s lips and Hanji remained completely oblivious.

“Rico has already offered to partake in some underground fight clubs for some extra cash. I feel sorry for the people she’s going to be up against, she’s going to completely wreck them. But what’s really going to be exciting is the new people we’re hopefully going to discover! You saw a whole team in your vision, so it’s going to be exciting to see who it is and what powers they have!”

Petra’s eyes flicked to Hanji’s lips again. Hanji still remained oblivious.

“Even what you can do is amazing! Your sniping skills are be--” Hanji was muffled by Petra’s lips coming into contact with their own, Petra’s hands pulling Hanji down so that they stayed within reach. Hanji’s eyes slipped shut as they became engrossed into the kiss themselves, not seeing a grossed out Zara enter the bunker.

“Hey, I don’t recommend using the bathroom we haven’t eve--” Zara looked at the couple kissing and did a 180, heading back the way she came in. “Nevermind, I’ll come back later!”

At the sound of Zara shutting the door behind her, Hanji pulled away from the kiss, springing to their feet to hide the blush both parties were sharing.

“I’m sorry,” Petra started, “it was rude of me to interrupt you with that. I won’t do it again.”

“Don’t worry! I enjoyed it!” Hanji paused briefly. “So, uh… do I have to start talking if I want to kiss you again?” Hanji scratched the back of their neck awkwardly.

“Just lean down, dork.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the song zara is singing is janelle monae's tightrope


	3. Wolves of Brooklyn

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 0907 HOURS, 16TH AUGUST 2011**

“Good morning, everyone! Petra wants to know if you guys want pancakes or waff-- whoa.”

The entire back wall was almost covered in large monitors that certainly weren’t there a few hours ago and most of the equipment had been connected to various power sources. Rico was perched precariously on a ladder, screwing another monitor into place while Zara sat slumped over her desk. Hanji glanced at the only desk currently in the room and took in the half empty can of instant coffee and the mass of paper and wiring spread out over the floor.

At the sound of Hanji’s voice, Zara jerked upright and straightened her glasses. “Wha- oh good morning, Hanji.”

Hanji raised an eyebrow at her fatigued tone and bloodshot eyes. “When was the last time you slept properly?”

Zara hid her yawn behind a hand and swivelled around to check the time and date on a monitor. “Uh… two and a half days? It must’ve been a while, I have no memory of changing my pronouns to suit today’s gender. Or yesterday’s.” Zara blinked for a few seconds. “Yep, still she/her.”

“I keep telling her to go to sleep properly but she’s being stubborn. And waffles please.” Rico said from somewhere above them. Zara held her hands defensively at Hanji’s slightly disapproving look.

“I won’t be able to sleep until these monitors go up and I work a few more things out anyway. Too many things going on in here.” She tapped her forehead and stifled another yawn.

Hanji glanced back up at the wall of monitors and quickly counted them. “Are you sure you’re going to need this many?”

“Better safe than sorry. They’re also all mounted on frames so that we can take them all off the wall quickly if we ever need to leave in a hurry.”

Hanji nodded. “That’s a good idea. We should look into doing that for all our other supplies too.”

Zara snapped her fingers. “Which reminds me, I need to give you a general idea of what I had in mind for the security here.”

“Oh?” They moved to lean against Zara’s desk.

“What I have installed currently is cameras inside and outside the base in every room we have set up. And motion sensors outside the base and the surrounding streets so we know if anyone is getting close. Everything will feed back to Kimberly and Tiffany, who will do a fab job of processing all this information. Important rooms like my cave, your lab, the armoury and all that jazz has a handprint and retinal scanner, and standard rooms like the kitchen and the bedrooms have magnetic locks that lock down if we have an intruder. This goes for all the security systems, the whole base goes on lockdown if someone stumbles in.”

“And you managed to get this how?”

“I blackmailed the shit out of people.” Zara deadpanned. “Before I fell back asleep, I was working into hacking into every security database I could find for extra information and anything that could give us a leg up. This is where the monitors come in: you guys are locally going to hack stuff for me so I can access security cameras around the city and from there, I can tap into the feeds and then I have New York City at my fingertips.”

“Hack? None of us are hacking experts like you, Zara.” Rico chipped in, finally descending the ladder.

“I used it loosely. All you have to do is find a security box, crack it open, do as I say or use the equipment I gave you and it’s done and sorted. Make sure nobody sees you because I’m not sure if it’s a state offence or a federal offence.”

“That depends on what you’re hacking really.” Rico said absentmindedly, picking up another monitor and heading back up the ladder.

“On top of that, I have two prototype security ideas. One I was working on in MI6, and another I was just discussing with Rico. Blood recognition is the one I was working on, give a sample of your DNA and we’ll know exactly who is in this base. Anyone who doesn’t have a recognised blood ID will make the alarm go off and the base will go into lockdown. The second idea isn’t particularly for us: I’ve got two computers scanning every database I’ve hacked into for signs of people with powers and they’re storing the information they’ve found on their slave drives. If a person is outed, or is considered suspicious, we look into them or failing that, I’ll see if I can get them out safely and remove them from the situation they’re in.”

“Do you need some help with the blood recognition?”

“I may need to borrow some of your equipment once I have the database up, coded thoroughly and made sure the encryptions have encryptions, and those encryptions have encryptions, and so on.” Zara took a breath. “I think that’s everything.”

Hanji poked Zara’s side gently. “Seriously though, after breakfast you’re going to sleep. You’ve done an extraordinary amount of work in three days.”

“But Hanji…” Zara whined.

Hanji covered their ears and started to walk out backwards. “Not listening! Sleep, or I’ll knock you out for a few hours myself. And you haven’t told me whether you wanted pancakes or waffles yet.”

Zara held up her hands in defeat. “Pancakes.”

Hanji tipped their head slightly in acknowledgement. “I’ll call you two when Petra’s ready.”

**TWENTY MINUTES LATER**

“I called them to come up here ten minutes ago!” Hanji exclaimed through a half eaten pancake.

Petra sighed. “I can’t believe I’m about to say this to two grown adults but _your food is getting cold_!” The last part was a loud shout: the loudness was easily achievable for someone who used to be in the military. There were a few beats of silence before the sound of the creaky lift was heard.

“Alright alright mother, we’re here.” Zara said tiredly as she walked in and sat down heavily on one of the dining benches in the mess hall. Petra slid a plate of pancakes in front of her and watched as Rico piled her plate with food. The four of them ate in companionable silence.

“So what are you two doing today?” Rico asked fifteen minutes later as she munched on her seventh waffle. She stopped and frowned a little before spreading another large dollop of nutella onto the waffle.

“Petra and I are going to Ikea because the living room is looking awfully bare. And we need to borrow your truck.”

Rico stopped mid-chew. “I’m driving to Albany today. Zara needs to pick up some bulky tech and I need the truck. Although she’s definitely not coming with me now.” She gestured over to Zara, who had nodded off again over her pancakes.

“Oh! Well in that case, we’ll just go and have a look at what we might want and what will fit then. We’ll bring some of those catalogues back and we can all decide together.”

Rico nodded and finished off her food. “You two have fun then. I’m going to take this one to bed and go. I should be back some time this afternoon.”

With that, Rico stood up from her stool and very carefully picked Zara up bridal style before slowly walking back to the lift. Kicking the down button with her boot, Rico adjusted Zara in her arms as Zara adjusted herself. She pressed her face into the crook of Rico’s neck and promptly started snoring.

When the lift finished it’s route, it creaked open, revealing an expansive space of which would soon be the power training room. Rico took a right, heading towards Zara’s cave. Scanning her hand and retina with some difficulty, she finally entered the room.

In the corner of Zara’s cave, next to the large computer setup, was a futon that was piled up with cushions and pillows complete with a thick quilt. Rico gently lay Zara in the middle of it, the hacker instinctively pulling the quilt up to her shoulders and curling up. Rico only spared a quick glance to see if Zara was comfortable before checking that they had their truck keys, soon making their way back to the surface.

As Rico pulled out of the base, she spotted Hanji and Petra walking together with their fingers interlocked: only Hanji turned around to give Rico a wave before the truck turned off.

“Who was that?”

“Rico. They’re off to Albany now.”

Petra hummed as her response, stepping in closer to Hanji as they walked to ward off the cold a little more. She smiled when she felt a thumb rubbing across her hand, Petra looked up at them and proceeded to squint her eyes.

“When was the last time you had a shower?”

Hanji cocked their head in thought for a moment. “The third day we moved in. Why?”

“You should go for one later then. Especially since Zara’s asleep, and Rico’s out of town, so we’ll have the entire base to ourselves. We could have a little break.”

At this, they froze. “You mean sex?”

“No!” Petra blushed at the curious stares of fellow pedestrians. “I’ll be ready when you’re ready.” She squeezed Hanji’s hand. “I just thought you’d like to cuddle and spend some time together. Especially since we’ve been busy for the past two days.”

“Oh!” Hanji grinned. “Definitely! I love spending time with you!” They removed their hand from Petra’s to sling their arm over Petra’s shoulders, giving her a side hug as they continued walking.

While the weather was definitely calmer than last week’s, it was still freezing and even the New York natives found themselves hurrying up to get themselves out of the cold. Hanji was seemingly lost in their own thoughts, a smile on their face as they strolled through the streets and was completely oblivious to the cold.

Half an hour passed and not a word was shared between them. It wasn’t until they took a right where they should’ve took a left did Petra stop.

“Did we just take the wrong turn? This isn’t Beard Street.”

“I think we did.” Hanji replied, eyeing up the dank alleyway they found themselves in. In the center of the alleyway was an improvised shelter made of nothing but degraded tarp as a roof and two wooden poles that held it up: there was nothing that could protect the user from the wind, or the cold.

Petra looked closer. A shaggy grey wolf was curled around a sleeping figure protectively, only the wolf was around the size of a small bear. There were darker patches of fur along its back, which rose and fell with every breath it took. The person was almost entirely engulfed in the beast’s fur and shifted slightly as Hanji and Petra watched.

“That wolf looks familiar. I think I saw it in that vision of our team.” Hanji spun around quickly.

“What? That wolf?” Petra nodded slowly.

Hanji spun back around and stared at the wolf for a moment before setting off down the alley at a quick pace. Petra had to break into a jog to keep up with their long strides. “Why are we suddenly walking so fast?”

“That’s not a wolf.” Hanji confirmed. “Not unless wolves think in English.”

The wolf’s ears perked up at the sound of footsteps and slowly turned its head to face them. Both of them froze and the wolf made a guttural sound, sliding out from around the woman and turning to face them fully. A throaty, continuous growl rumbled from its chest and the wolf flattened its ears and curled its lips back, exposing razor sharp incisors.

Petra backed away minutely and reached out to grab Hanji’s shoulder. “Hanji… Hanji I don’t think this the best way to a--”

“I don’t suggest that you come any closer. The wolf is hungry.” A foreign voice cut through the air and looking past the snarling wolf, Petra could see the woman rise to her feet heavily and walk towards the wolf. She laid a hand on the beast’s neck and started to stroke the fur there, making the wolf relax considerably.

“Seriously, we have nothing you want so I suggest you fuck off to your warm homes before _Odjuret_ rips out your jugular.”

She was tall, easily reaching six feet and wearing several coats to ward off the cold. A smattering of freckles spread across her cheeks and nose and sharp brown eyes stared at them with slight disdain. The right side of the woman’s neck was scarred horribly, as if part of her flesh had been in the process of melting but had abruptly solidified, leaving it looking almost gelatinous, raised and dark red. The scarring disappeared beneath her coats and the stranger yanked her collar back up when she noticed what Petra was looking at.

“It’s rude to stare, you know.” The woman sniped, but Petra’s mind was somewhere else. Could it be both of them…?

Holding out her hands again, Petra approached the wolf slowly. “You’re not actually a wolf, are you?”

The strange woman scoffed. “Are you high, lady? Are we seeing the same thing here?”

Petra ignored her. “You two… I’ve seen you before. You and the wolf, except the wolf was human. A small blonde woman.”

At this, both the woman and the wolf bristled. “What the hell are you talking about?” The stranger demanded, her and the wolf taking a menacing step forward.

“I saw you in a vision.” Petra explained. The woman gave a short laugh and the wolf looked up at her.

“A vision? Would you like a crystal ball with all the bullshit you’re pulling?”

“It’s true.” Petra argued. “I know what you can both do.”

The woman gave another incredulous laugh. “Oh yeah? Do I have super powers too? Controlling the weather? Have super speed? Freeze things?”

“You make fire.”

At this, the woman’s mocking sneer wavered for a second before she quickly recomposed herself. “Really? You know what actually, that would be fuckin’ great. Then I wouldn’t be so bloody cold right now.”

“And your friend,” Petra gestured at the wolf, “doesn’t only change into a wolf. She can change into any animal actually.”

The stranger stared at her disbelievingly. “Does this giant wolf look like it can turn a rabbit or a cat or something?”

The wolf snorted at this and trotted forward until it was right in front of Petra. She stayed completely still as the beast sniffed her hands and her pockets before rearing up on its hind legs, putting its paws on her shoulders and sniffing her neck and upper body. It repeated this for Hanji and when it was seemingly satisfied with its inspection, the wolf sat in front of the telepath and stared at them with its intelligent blue eyes. Neither of them moved for a few long moments until Hanji nodded almost imperceptibly.

The wolf trotted back to her companion and bumped its nose against her hand. They looked at each other as if they were having a conversation with their eyes alone. Eventually, the woman sighed and turned on her heel to walk back to their bags. The wolf eyed them for few more moments before it bowed its head and almost instantly, a person was standing in front of them.

She was wearing nothing except a large shirt and looked no older than nineteen. Vibrant blue eyes studied both Hanji and Petra until the other woman came back and wordlessly handed her a pair of trousers and a large coat. The small blonde put them on quickly and went to stand close to the taller woman, linking their fingers together.

“How do you know they’re not out to get us?” The taller woman murmured quietly to her companion.

“I can sense that they’re not lying. And I threatened them.” The blonde said simply. “I believe my exact words were _if this turns out to be a trap, I will change back faster than I’ve ever done before and personally rip out both of your throats_. The one with the goggles is telepathic. I used them to talk considering I felt their mind trying to read mine before we started talking. And within their mind I saw the ginger woman. She has foresight and can turn invisible.”

The taller woman looked down at her companion with amusement, squeezing their fingers together before turning her attention back to Hanji and Petra.

“Alright Dream Girl and Professor X, you got us. What do you want?”

"How did you know our powers?" Petra started.

"I relied on your friend's telepathy to threaten them." The smaller woman said.

Both Hanji and Petra raised their brows. “How about we start with your names?”

“I’m Christa.” The shapeshifter put her free hand on her chest and tugged at her companion’s hand. “And grumpy over here is Ymir.”

“And grumpy here still hasn’t got an answer. What do you want?”

“We’re creating a team of superheroes and we would like you to join.”

Ymir scoffed again. “And why would we want to do that?”

“You’d be helping us show the world that people with superpowers aren’t to be feared, that we can be trusted and that we are no different from everyone else. That, and it’ll be a safe haven for people with powers.”

Christa eagerly looked up at her companion the same time Ymir tightened her grip on Christa’s fingers. “Sounds dangerous.”

“But we’d be helping people like us. And we’d be doing something useful with these powers.” Christa argued gently. Ymir inclined her head slightly and turned to face her.

“You really want to do this?”

The shapeshifter nodded eagerly. “I don’t want to do this without you though.” Her companion hesitated, scratching her scar absent-mindedly.

"Do you trust them that much?" Christa nodded again almost immediately. Ymir sighed and looked at Hanji and Petra, who were holding their breaths for an answer.

“We also have food, warm beds and showers.” Petra offered.

Ymir slapped her outer thigh. “I’m fuckin’ sold.”

Christa turned to look up at her with brightly shining eyes and a radiant smile, and Petra could see Ymir’s tough exterior melt for a second before she turned back to them.

“But if we’re going to do this, I have three conditions.” Ymir held up three fingers. “This already sounds dangerous as fuck without the whole discrimination against minorities that’s been happening recently.” Hanji inclined their head and indicated for her to continue.

“Condition number one: Christa is certainly not dying, getting locked up or getting seriously hurt for you people.” She put down one finger. “Condition number two: I am not dying, getting locked up or getting seriously hurt for you people.” She put down another. “Condition number three: my loyalties lie with Christa. We are both in this, or not at all. Are we clear?”

Both Hanji and Petra nodded. “None of those things will happen, we'll make sure of it.”

Ymir made a small noise. “We’ll see about that.” She turned to her companion and swung their linked hands slightly. “You got anything to add?”

Christa shook her head. “I couldn’t have put it better myself.”

“Exactly how many people were in your vision?” Ymir asked when the thought occurred to her.

“Around twenty?” Petra scratched her head. “I’m not entirely sure. There are two that looked exactly the same so I don’t know if they’re clones or twins or something.”

“Twenty? How many do we have now?”

“Six, including you two.”

“Well, lucky I like making new friends then.” Ymir replied dryly. Tugging on Christa's hand, they both went to retrieve their things.

Both Hanji and Petra watched as they gathered their belongings. “Well, this was significantly more productive than going to Ikea.”

Petra nodded in agreement. “Ymir can be extremely versatile and Christa will be invaluable if we need surveillance or stealth.” An excited bark of agreement made them look down to see a large golden retriever bounding around their legs. Petra laughed and scratched the dog behind her ears as Ymir reached them as well, adjusting the two large bags on her shoulders.

The taller woman inclined her head at Christa, who had sat down next to Hanji’s feet and was enthusiastically wagging her tail. “She doesn’t have shoes, and it’s freezing.”

Hanji nodded in understanding. "Ready to go?" Ymir grunted and Christa barked again, tugging gently at the bottom of Hanji’s coat.

Smiling at Christa’s enthusiasm, the four of them set off down the alley again. They emerged out of the shadows of the buildings and into sunlight, and the dog dashed back into the alley briefly only to come back out as a grey cat. The cat stretched and yawned widely before trotting along beside Ymir.

“Absolutely incredible.” Hanji muttered under their breath as they observed Christa leaping up to walk along the top of a low wall.

“She most certainly is.” The fondness in Ymir’s voice was clearly audible and the small smile on her face as she watched the cat made Hanji smile slightly as well.

It wasn’t long until Ymir spoke up again.

“I would tell you how I found out about my fire, but at this point you people are total strangers and that makes it none of your business.”

Petra nodded. “We understand. You don’t owe us an explanation to anything.”

Ymir was about to respond when a man bumped into her, his dog scaring Christa enough for her to begin hissing at the canine in an attempt to scare off the dog. Hanji almost picked up Christa in the middle of the street, completely enthralled by her shapeshifting abilities.

“She even adopts animal behavioural instincts! This is incredible, Petra!” They continued to watch Christa’s every move, clinging onto Petra’s arm as they did.

The look on Christa’s feline face was almost smug, especially when Hanji continued to pour over her.

Ymir nudged the cat with her foot gently when they reached a pedestrian crossing. "Show-off." She said fondly.

Christa responded by flicking her tail in Ymir’s direction. None of them spoke until they reached the gate of the base. The cat ducked behind a line of dumpsters for a few moments and re-emerged as a human.

“We’re using a military base as a home?” Christa enquired as she pulled on her trousers and coat again.

“Zara had a few places that we could use, and since Petra’s vision gave us almost twenty people, we--”

“You stole a military base.” Ymir deadpanned.

“ _Repurposed_ it.” Hanji corrected.

"And the military isn't going to come looking for a reason why someone is using their facility because...?"

"Zara has contacts."

"That's the reason a lot of stuff is going to be possible, isn't it? " Hanji nodded at Ymir’s question and quickly opened the gate. Christa’s eyes widened when she took in the size of the base, a place they’d be soon calling home. It wasn’t long until they were shrugging off their coats inside the base, thankful for the warmth.

“You have decent heating in here so I’m liking this already.” Christa wriggled her toes against the cool floor and took one of the bags from Ymir.

“I’ll go get some socks and a pair of boots that may fit you,” Petra said, “saves you from walking around on the cold floor. I’ll be back in a moment, go help yourself to food in the kitchen!” Christa didn’t even have a chance to refuse as Petra was already out of the room and into the barracks.

At the thought of food, Ymir instantly moved into the kitchen and began to rifle through the cupboards. She was nearly drooling at the sight of all this food that she could eat. Internally, she was happy that they’d never have to go a day without eating again, because seeing Christa starved was an image Ymir would like to never see again.

The lift creaked to life behind them, and Zara came stumbling off it when it screeched to a stop. Rubbing her eyes, she stopped at the entrance to the kitchen and stopped when she saw Ymir and Christa.

Christa raised a hand as a weak greeting and Zara blinked.

"Ah, you're awake!" Hanji stopped and frowned. "Why are you awake? You’ve only been asleep for two hours."

"Needed to pee and the downstairs toilet hasn’t been fixed yet.” Zara gestured at Ymir and Christa. “Who's this?"

"New people!"

Zara blinked again, now looking more awake. She stepped in front of them both. “Zara Smith,” she said, offering a hand.

Christa looked at the proffered hand in slight confusion for a few moments before shaking it enthusiastically.

“It’s lovely to meet you! I’m Christa. The one going through your cupboards is Ymir.”

“ _Our_ cupboards. Our home is your home.” Hanji said.

Ymir pulled a bag of chips from the cupboards and twisted to look at Hanji. “Yeah? That sounds real nice actually.”

Christa smiled and made a noise of agreement. “Thank you for doing this.”

Hanji held up their hands. “No problem. So we’ll give you the tour and you two can pick your rooms, or room if you prefer to stay together. Our showers are also communal, but we’re going to put up some tracks on the walls so we can put up shower curtains for whoever wants to use them.”

Ymir shrugged. “It’s been too cold lately to use the public ones, so if your water is actually hot then we really don’t care.”

“Don’t worry, the water becomes scalding even if you only turn it to halfway.”

"Good. The hotter the better."

"Won't you burn yourself?" Zara asked.

Ymir clicked her fingers, causing a flickering flame to appear and lick around her fingertips. "Nope."

Hanji made a noise of amazement and moved closer to Ymir. "You can produce your own fire! This is amazing! What does it feel like where the fire comes in contact with your skin?"

Ymir shrugged and twisted her wrist, letting the fire grow and envelop her hand. "Tingly. And warm."

"And you're resistant to it too!" " Hanji’s eyes flickered to the scarring on Ymir’s neck. "Then how did you get--"

"Still strangers, remember?" Ymir interrupted loudly. Hanji nodded.

"Of course. I apologise.”

Ymir grunted in acknowledgement and closed her hand into a fist, making the fire disappear in a small puff of smoke. “Comes in handy on cold nights when it isn't messing with my body temperature. It's cold enough without your powers making you colder for some stupid reason."

"We can work on finding out why it does that, along with developing and controlling your powers more."

"Can we have that shower first?" Christa piped up.

"Of course!" Hanji pushed themselves off the counter and motioned for Ymir and Christa to follow. "I'll let you pick a room first so you can put your bags down."

Fifteen minutes and one bag of chips later, Hanji had barely shut the door before Ymir was happily stripping off and almost skipped into the showers, turning the knob for hot water almost all the way to the maximum. She let out a loud sigh as the boiling water drenched her and held out her hand for the other woman to join.

Christa, who had disrobed much slower and was folding her clothes neatly, eyed the amount of steam coming from Ymir’s shower and shook her head. "I don't need to look like a lobster even in human form, you know."

"What? It's not that hot!" Ymir protested. Christa raised an eyebrow at the steam. "Okay, it probably is."

Christa, carefully avoiding the scalding steam, turned on a shower two heads down at a more sensible temperature. The relief was instantaneous. Weeks of muck and dirt were now washing down the drain and Christa’s mood was lifting by the second. She briefly looked over to Ymir just in time to see her stretch, barely managing to suppress the blush. To hide her staring, she reached for the soap and began to wash herself.

A further fifteen minutes passed, and Christa could not stop her staring. Eventually, she gave in, turning the shower head off and walking over to Ymir’s: she quickly pushed the knob back around, turning the temperature down enough to make Ymir jump and to allow Christa to stand under the spray.

“Fuck me! That’s cold, Christa!” Ymir complained, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Stop being such a baby and turn around.” Doing as Christa said, a pair of arms wound themselves around Ymir’s waist and she smiled as a kiss was pressed to her chest.

"You know, I thought last night that today was going to be a bad day."

Christa looked up so that she was facing her companion. "Why's that?"

“I dunno. I just had a gut feeling when I fell asleep on you that something really bad was going to happen.” The taller woman shrugged. “I’m not going to let go of that feeling just because the people who took us in are goody two shoes.”

“I never took you for a pessimist, Ymir.”

“Says the optimist.”

It was Christa’s turn to shrug slightly. “Positivity can change a lot of things.”

“Like you walking into my shower, turning the temperature right down and invading my personal space?”

“Yep.” The smaller women pulled away slightly. “Unless you want me to leave, that is.”

“Depends what you had in store. A back rub, maybe a foot rub maybe?”

“Not even the Devil would go near your feet.” Christa deadpanned. “And I was think more along the oral side of things.”

Ymir blushed as Christa pressed herself flush against her nude frame. “It _is_ clean down there, right?”

“Actually, it was the first thing I cleaned.”

“Good.” With that, Christa pulled down Ymir into a searing kiss. Ymir had barely entwined her fingers into Christa’s wet hair when she pressed a thigh between her own, causing the taller woman to grunt into her counterpart’s mouth.

Pulling away from Ymir’s lips, she bit her own while giving her lover a once over. “Now, if your moaning is as loud as your snoring, we may have to turn more of the showers on.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 0534 HOURS, 17TH AUGUST 2011**

The only working lamp cast a soft, dim glow throughout the room and Ymir shifted minutely to free her right hand from under Christa’s body. The small blonde was sleeping peacefully and half sprawled over Ymir, exhausted by their previous exertions and Ymir felt the heat stir within her belly as she recalled them.

She started to trace her fingers lightly along Christa’s creamy back, the skin smooth and unblemished except for what looked suspiciously like long healed cigarette burns on her lower back. Her fingers lingered over them for a few moments and she grit her teeth, feeling their rough texture before tracing back up. Her fingers passed over the claw marks on her right shoulder and stroked her jaw gently. Christa stirred in her sleep slightly, pressing herself tighter against Ymir’s long frame and the taller woman smiled.

It wasn’t long until the ticklish sensations caused by Ymir’s curious fingers stirred Christa from her slumber. She let out a low purring noise and buried her face into the crook of Ymir’s neck.

“Morning, sleepyhead.” Christa responded with another mewling sound and leaned up slightly to press as kiss to Ymir’s jaw.

“How are you feeling?”

Christa stretched like a cat and yawned. “Warm. My muscles hurt a little.”

Ymir frowned slightly and began to massage her lower back. “Did I hurt you?”

“No it hurts like… the stretch I do after I’ve been sleeping around you all night as a wolf. A really nice kind of ache.” She yawned again and shook her head.

Ymir let out a small sigh of relief. “I’m glad. Aren’t you also glad that we waited until we weren’t in some cold and dirty alleyway for this?”

“Or a shelter where we were sharing a room with two other people?”

Ymir laughed. “I think these walls might be sound proof.” She tapped the wall behind her head with a knuckle. She turned back to Christa with a sly grin. “Good thing too.”

Christa blushed all the way down to her chest and Ymir laughed before kissing her gently. Nimble fingers grasped her shoulders as Christa kissed back eagerly. A warm tongue probed at her bottom lip, requesting permission, so Christa opened her mouth slightly and let out a small moan as she faintly tasted herself on Ymir’s tongue. The smaller woman allowed her hands to move, slipping her hand instead around the back of her lover's neck as if to pull her closer.

Ymir was the first to pull back breathlessly. “Quick learner, are we?”

“I already knew how to kiss, don’t be such an egotistical jerk.” Christa teased.

Ymir put a hand over her heart in mock offense, laughing quietly when Christa giggled and kissed her shoulder.

“You have so many freckles. I wonder how many there are.” She observed, using her index finger to play connect the dots with the freckles on her shoulders.

Ymir shivered slightly at the ticklish sensation. “Are you going to count them?”

Christa grinned at her. “Yeah. Not now though, too sleepy.”

“I’ve never seen this one before either.” Ymir murmured as her fingers traced over the claw marks on the other woman’s shoulder.

“I got into a fight with a stray rottweiler over food. It clawed me, almost ripped my shoulder open actually but I still got the food.” Christa responded absentmindedly. She froze for a second before lifting her head up to look at Ymir. “I’ve never remembered that before now.”

Ymir cocked an eyebrow. “Really? Do you remember how you got the bites on your left calf and hand?”

Christa twisted her torso around to look at the eight faint puncture scars on her calf. “I think… I must have gotten in the way of a very territorial dog.” She furrowed her brow and squinted slightly. “I remember it was in a park, behind a brick wall, and it was unexpected.” Christa paused for a few moments. “I’ve never remembered that until now either.”

Ymir mirrored Christa’s brilliant smile, taking in the way the corners of her eyes crinkled and the way her dimples looked. “This is great!”

Christa nodded happily. “It’s been really great lately, hasn’t it?” She laid her head back down on Ymir’s shoulder and began to draw shapes over the taller woman’s freckles again. “I mean, I'm remembering things, we’ve gotten off the streets and we’re doing something useful with these powers.”

Ymir hummed in agreement and closed her eyes. A comfortable silence fell over them and soon they could hear the faint sounds of birds chirping. Christa was so pleasantly warm and the way she was tracing over her skin made her extremely relaxed. She was just about to drift off when she was awoken by the sound of Christa calling for her.

“Ymir?” The brunette grunted in acknowledgement and the fingers over her skin stopped. She cracked open an eye to see Christa lift herself up and prop her elbows on either side of her body.

“Do you think that Hanji might be able to help me remember?”

That woke her up fully. Ymir furrowed her brow slightly and tilted her head. “From when you were stuck or before that?”

Christa looked down at her intertwined fingers before replying. “Both.”

“I think they might be able to, with all the mind stuff.” Ymir hesitated before continuing. “The real question is whether or not you really want to.”

“I don’t know.” Christa said quietly after a few moments of silence. “Part of me wants to know who I was but the other part of me is scared of what I might find.”

At this, Ymir gave a small sigh and tilted her head up slightly to kiss Christa’s forehead. “Maybe… start with the period of time where you were stuck? Then when you clear that you can decide then whether or not you want to go back more.”

Christa nodded minutely. "That's a good idea."

"I'll be with you every step of the way if you want me to be."

Christa’s answering smile was nothing more than a quirk to the corner of her lips and she nodded, pushing herself forward slightly to press their foreheads together. Their noses brushed and Ymir tangled a hand in golden hair in reassurance.

“I’m really glad I stopped those jerks from mugging you, you know.” Christa breathed out and Ymir began to stroke her back again.

“Me too, Christa, me too.” Ymir smirked. “But you know, I think I was doing pretty alright before you came in and almost ripped that guy’s arm off.” Christa pulled back slightly to see the amusement in Ymir’s eyes and the teasing smile on her lips.

Christa prodded Ymir's ribs. “Oh yeah? And how would you have fought them off? Trip over your feet again?”

“I would have found a way to fend them off without your furry ass ruining my fun.”

“Does your fun include eating gravel?”

Ymir stared right at Christa in mock unamusement and Christa laughed. They fell silent again shortly afterwards, not seeing the need to exchange any more words. Not until Christa delved back onto the original topic.

“Do you think Hanji’s awake?”

“At this hour? I’d give it 50/50, I’m sure they have the weirdest sleeping pattern.”

After Christa looked slightly crestfallen, Ymir reassured her. “Give it an hour or two, think about it some more. And I’m not sure if I want to move out of bed yet.”

Christa, happy with the answer, settled back down again and stared outside the window, content with the place she was currently in.

**THREE HOURS LATER**

“Hanji?” A small voice prompted them to stop and turn to find the source of the sound. It was Christa, standing at the door to their room and twisting her hands together. Hanji gently put down the to-do list they were reading, gave a sleeping Petra one last look before moving out of the room.

“You… you’re telepathic, right?” At Hanji’s small nod, Christa straightened her posture and looked at them. “Can you do anything with memories?”

Hanji frowned slightly at the question and took a few steps closer. “What do you mean?”

Christa went back to looking at her feet. “Well… there was a long period of time where I was stuck as an animal, and I don’t remember anything from those years or anything before that either. I was just wondering if… you could help me try and remember?”

Hanji did a double take. “Wait, you were stuck as an animal for _years_?”

Christa nodded minutely. “I… well, I was…”

Seeing Christa’s obvious discomfort, Hanji jumped in. “Uh, well you don’t have to explain it to me now. I can try to do this for you but I don’t think it’s going to work very well if you’re still uncomfortable with it.” They reached out hesitantly and paused for a second before awkwardly patting the woman on the shoulder.

“I’m sorry. I’ve only ever told Ymir about this.”

“There’s no need to apologise. I must admit, I am not too great with emotions because I’m autistic, but if you need anyone to talk to outside of Ymir, Petra and I are great listeners. I highly recommend Petra because she’s fantastic!”

Christa nodded gratefully. “I might do that."

Clapping her gently on the arm, Hanji nudged Christa to look at them. “Whenever you feel that you are ready to talk about it and start recovering them, just tell me and I will try my absolute hardest to help you.”

“Thank you. You’re so kind to strangers.”

“Hey, I aim for you to see me as a friend rather than a stranger soon.” Hanji smiled. “Come on, let’s get some breakfast. I’m going to cook some for Petra!”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> holy shitting balls we're so sorry for this delay!!! crap happened and one of us had seven major assignments all due within three weeks so writing sort of took a back seat. but we are almost halfway through the next one so hopefully that won't take that too long. thank you for waiting!


	4. Aratana Hajimari

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh my god this chapter came out faster than i came out of the closet. regardless, enjoy! and there are warnings for #abuse mention and #death so people who have extreme emotional reactions to that i suggest you be careful! or if you can't read it at all, let us know and we'll send you a version without the triggers. if you think something needs tagging and we haven't tagged it, let us know and we'll edit asap!

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 0600 HOURS, 27TH AUGUST 2011**

Petra sat hunched over a desk, dutifully cleaning her Barrett as Rico shined their claymore. They were both currently sat in Rico’s armory, using artificial light from the ceiling to see what they were doing. Looking up from the disassembled rifle, Petra took in the size of the sword and then looked towards Rico.

“Why a giant sword? Wouldn’t a shotgun be more effective?”

“It’s become common how to fight with guns and how to protect yourself against guns. Swords? That’s old fashioned. Only basement dwellers and history buffs know how to protect themselves against swords. So imagine this: you’re fully expecting a person with a shotgun or another firearm to appear when a person starts coming at you with a giant fucking sword. Scares the shit out of them every time.”

Petra swallowed, rubbing the back of her head. “I see where you’re coming from now. You sure do keep your intimidating style out of work as well.”

“Oh?”

“It doesn’t exactly help that we’re also in a room that features more weapons than I’ve seen in my entire military career.”

Rico turned around to gaze upon her collection of firearms. From standard sidearms to RPG launchers, Rico probably had it all and every single firearm was hung up on the wall in it’s proper place: Rico even went the extra mile to have a filing system on the wall, filing by firearm type, ammunition used and the reload speed. Even the melee weapons had their own section.

“You used guns as a job and you’re scared by the amount of firearms I have?”

Petra shook her head. “I’m more scared of the fact of how easily you acquired them.”

“Oh.” Putting down their cleaning equipment, Rico rested her forearms on the table they were using. “If I’m being honest, so am I. Some of the weapons were confiscated from people who shouldn’t have firearms in the first place. Like that RPG launcher over there.”

“You’re kidding.” Her jaw agape, Petra was clearly horrified. “That’s terrifying.”

“Isn’t it? I got it off some spoiled white rich kid who was pro-gun as all fuck. The upside was that he didn’t have any grenades with it. He just had the launcher.”

“That’s partly relieving. Gun control needs to be much more tighter than it actually is right now instead of being able to buy a rifle while you’re getting your groceries.” Petra visibly shuddered. “Guns are killing machines, not toys.”

Rico nodded. “I agree with you.”

“Then why do you have so many?”

“Why do I have so many guns?” Rico paused for a moment to crack their neck. “Only a few are actually mine. The SWAT weapons especially. I like to think that this armory is actually a giant confiscation room.”

“You confiscated nearly _all_ of these weapons?”

“Yep.” Rico looked proud of themselves. “From nasty people I was hired to kill and from civilians who shouldn’t have the firearms at all.”

“You have truly done the world a favour.”

“It was a pleasure.” Glancing at the watch on their wrist, Rico stood up and carefully sheathed their sword and returned the weapon to it’s place. “Alright. I’m off to get Hanji and we’re off to Albany again to pick up their science equipment. Which means their lab will be complete and it’ll be one less room to stock.”

“Okay! Stay safe!” Petra gave one last smile to Rico before they left the armoury and locked the door behind them.

**ONE HOUR LATER**

“Why are we taking the dirt track again?” Hanji looked away from the bare train tracks to face Rico, thankful that they took a 4x4 that Zara liberated a few days before because the suspension was making the ride a lot more comfortable.

“One, to avoid traffic.” Rico never looked away from the road as they spoke. “Two, to avoid cameras.”

“Ah! Very clever!” Hanji grinned and patted Rico on the bicep before returning to looking out the passenger side window. Five minutes passed before Hanji prodded Rico again, Hanji’s eyebrows furrowed again. “Rico, is it me or does it look like that train is going to hit those beams?” Hanji pointed to a bridge that the train was fast approaching, which had metal beams that had snapped off the main structure as was now dangling dangerously into the path of the fast approaching train.

Rico took her eyes off the road for a moment to see what Hanji was talking about: Hanji was correct, the damaged bridge was in the path of the train. Rico squinted further down the tracks before their eyes open wide in shock.

“Holy shit!” Rico started, quickly changing gears and speeding the vehicle up, “that’s a woman standing in the path of the train!” She pushed down the gas pedal further as she pointed towards the figure standing on the tracks with their feet apart and leaning forwards slightly, as if preparing for impact. Careering off the dirt track, they pulled up dangerously close to the derailing train, not caring about their own personal safety. Rico even went as far as preparing to jump out of the 4x4 to push the woman out of the way when the train collided with her.

Instead of the front of the train being painted red, the woman gripped the train with such force that the metal in her hands began to buckle. The train continued to push her along the tracks, some of its carriages looking dangerously close to derailing, but she was pushing back with force that surpassed the train’s: slowly, the train’s speed decreased and with each amount of energy lost, she applied less of her own energy.

As the train screeched slowly to a halt, Rico slammed on the brakes.

“Holy shit, is she--” Rico began.

A tremendous shout was heard as the heroine hauled the train back onto it’s wheels and the tracks and only letting go once the transport looked stable.

“Christ _Almighty_.”

Both Hanji and Rico were only stunned momentarily before piling out of the vehicle, Hanji going straight for the train and it’s occupants, and Rico heading towards the stranger.

“Hey! Are you okay?” As Rico approached, they could make out more details: she was tall, well built and was dark skinned for someone who looked of Japanese descent. She was also injured, considering the way she was holding her shoulder and the fact that her grey v-neck was stained with blood.

“Can you hear me?” Rico called out again now that they were closer. Immediately afterwards, the stranger bent over to vomit from the sudden overexertion of her body. As she bent over, Rico spotted the gang tattoo on the back of her neck, the glock she was carrying in the waistband of her trousers and the filled teardrop tattoo on her left hand’s middle finger.

Without warning, Rico drove her knee into her face and was about to do it a second time when the knee was blocked by a hand, the woman’s leg sweeping Rico’s own leg off the ground. In that split second, the stranger was on top of her and was repeatedly punching her in the face. On the third hit, Rico caught the punch and using the stranger’s own weight against her, she flipped them over. Before Rico could do any damage, she had kicked her off and both got to their feet.

A plan sprung into Rico’s mind and she instantly deployed it. Drawing her butterfly knife, she charged at the stranger and took a wild high stab: the stranger ducked under it, taking the opportunity to climb up Rico and wrap her legs around her neck while tilting her weight forward into a throw. During this, Rico used her free hand to grab the glock in her opponent’s waistband.

Now on the ground, and her arm in an armbar, Rico pushed herself into a backwards roll to twist her arm out of the armbar before it was dislocated. Pocketing her knife, she backed off while pointing the gun at her opponent.

“Do not move!” Rico barked, keeping her distance while sighting up the opponent’s head. “Get on your knees and put your hands on your head!”

When the stranger made no move, Rico pressed her further.

“And don’t even bother to goad me into stepping closer to you, I know a Krav Maga practitioner when I see one. We’re both powered, so let’s go about this the easy way.”

With no other option, the stranger got on her knees and put her hands on her head. This revealed more tattoos on the forearm, including a tattoo that signified she spent time in prison. Carefully approaching the surrendered opponent, Rico rummaged through her pockets and pulled out a zip tie, tying the stranger’s hands behind her back.

“I stopped a train,” were the first words the stranger said to Rico, “I can easily break out of a zip tie.”

“Yeah, I have your gun and I guarantee that I can use it a lot better than you can.” Rico shot back. “You’re coming with us before you abuse that power of yours.”

“Says the person who just attacked someone who just saved whole carriages of lives.” Stoic brown eyes stared right through Rico. “And _I’m_ the criminal here? Funny.”

Rico was about to reply when Hanji appeared from the first carriage. “Hey! Rico!” They started. “All their recent memories are erased and those who have injuries are stabilised somewhat. We should get Zara to make an anonymous 911--” Hanji paused and froze mid step when they saw the position that the woman was in.

“Why have you detained her?”

Passing the gun over to Hanji, Rico carefully made her way behind the woman, gesturing Hanji to follow. Brushing aside her hair revealed the gang tattoo Rico spotted earlier. On the back of her neck was a closed fist, it’s knuckles pointing towards Hanji and Rico: on the middle finger was a black 6 and under the fist was a non detailed spanner.

“Sixth Street Brawlers. Violent all encompassing Asian street gang with ties to the Yakuza and the Triad. Given the style of the tattoo, this lovely woman here is an enforcer, as represented by the fist, and a mechanic, the spanner. This gang is most famous for drug trafficking, street fights, fight clubs, street racing and the occasional torture.”

“I still don’t understand why you detained her.”

“She was carrying the gun you’re holding.”

Hanji’s eyes widened in realisation. “Then I suggest we take her back to base. Considering her powers and the fact that the police and emergency services are going to be all over this area soon.”

“At least drive my car back to wherever we’re going.” The stranger nods her head to the black Ford Falcon Cobra behind her. “My scarf is in there, among other things, and I don’t want the police getting their dirty hands all over it. The keys are still in the transmission.”

“I’ll do it.” Hanji offered, giving the gun back to Rico. “Take her to the medbay as soon as we get back. She may be a gang member, but she doesn’t deserve to deal with her injuries without help.” And with that, Hanji jogged off to the car, leaving Rico to escort the woman off to the truck.

Fortunately enough, the woman was co-operative for the long ride back. She mainly kept to herself, keeping her eyes forward and focused on the road. When Rico pulled up and parked, she offered a hand out of the cab, but the woman shrugged it off and got out herself.

Entering the front room revealed Ymir and Christa watching TV and sitting on the new sofa they bought just last week from a more successful trip to Ikea. Ymir spotted them passing through the recreation room to the kitchen, and called out through a mouthful of doritos. “Who’s this?” Christa stared at her when crumbs were spat onto her clean white shirt.

“Gang member who just stopped a derailing train with her own fists.”

Ymir nodded, looking impressed. “Awesome. Are we keeping her?”

“Possibly. Depends where her loyalties lie.” With that, they exited the living room. Shortly afterwards, Hanji entered the base and passed Ymir and Christa, jogging into the kitchen before the lift went down into the bunker.

They passed through the training room, taking a left into the armoury and medbay: if they took a right, they would wind up in Zara’s cave. While the armoury had already been set up entirely, the medbay was still getting put together as it required a few more beds and cabinets to hold all the equipment. The woman sat on the nearest bed, eyes never leaving Rico’s form.

“I’m a healer. I’m going to attend to your injuries. Do I have permission to touch you?”

“Yes.” The woman simply said.

Hanji then picked up a pen and paper, ready to write down the injuries Rico listed.

“Thank you.” Rico pulled on a pair of nitrile gloves and began to perform the top to toe procedure after she cut the stranger out of her zip tie.

By the time she was done, the blood from the lacerations to the stranger’s legs had started to drip onto the plastic sheeting covering the floor. Rico indicated to remove her trousers while she stripped off her gloves. The woman removed her trousers wordlessly and sat completely still as Rico cleaned her wounds and closed them.

“You’ve ruined your shoes.” Rico gestured at the woman’s tattered shoes. “And you’ve got friction burns to the bottom of your feet.”

“I have more shoes. Also that doesn’t hurt.” Rico simply hummed, removed the splinters from the wooden train tracks and cleaned them. She waved her hand slowly over the burns and new skin grew over immediately. It took almost twenty minutes to completely pick out most of the splinters and by the time it had been completed, the woman was holding her left arm and grimacing in pain.

“You’ve broken your collarbone twice.” Rico placed a hand over each one and look at the woman. “This is going to hurt a little.”

“I can handl-” Her sentence was cut off by a loud groan as Rico made the bones move back in place before sealing together.  

“Doesn’t that hurt?” Asked Hanji, gesturing towards her swollen and purpling arm.

“Adrenaline is one hell of a painkiller. Shame it’s wearing off.” The woman smirked a little. “Maybe you should get yourself checked out as well.” Her eyes flicked towards the bruising forming on Rico’s jaw.

“Like I said, I’m a healer. They’ll be gone in a few minutes.” Rico placed her hands over the mangled arm and huffed out a breath. “Comminuted fracture for both bones in your forearm and you’ve shattered your wrist. You might need to bite on something for this because you’re probably going to burn through painkillers too quickly.”

The woman shook her head again and Rico gripped the forearm tightly so the bones could fix. Hanji watched as she paled slightly and clenched her other hand into a tight fist. It took a few minutes, but the woman let out an audible sigh when it was over and Rico went to wash her hands.

“I just sealed the pieces back together. Your arm, wrist and collarbone should be completely fixed in a week, but I’m not sure if you have any latent healing powers. I’m surprised that you were even able to put up a fight.”

“Adrenaline. Plus my other power helped.”

“You have two? Which ones?” Hanji asked, partly to distract the woman from Rico and mainly out of curiosity.

“As you saw, super strength. And enhanced condition. Like Captain America but better.”

“How did you know?”

“I googled it.” Hanji’s mouth formed an O shape in understanding. At this point, Zara came into the medbay, wordlessly passing Hanji a file before quickly exiting. Hanji then passed it over to Rico.

“You’re the officer. I’m the scientist.” Hanji said, gladly taking the back seat in this situation.

“If you really wanted to know things about me, all you had to do was ask.” She paused as Hanji attached a sling around her neck to support her damaged left arm. “I am Mikasa Ackerman. Who are you?”

“Rico Brzenska.” She nodded towards Hanji. “Hanji Zoe.” Rico began to rifle through the file, brows rising when she found Mikasa’s criminal record. “That’s an extensive rap sheet you have here. Let’s see.” Rico took a breath. “Violent gang association, aggravated criminal damage, possession of firearm with criminal intent, making threats to kill, wounding or grievous bodily harm with intent to cause grievous bodily harm, offences related to money laundering investigations, acquisition, use or possession of criminal property, tipping off fellow gang members, criminal damage, possession of firearm without certificate, carrying a loaded firearm in a public place, trespassing with a firearm, making threats to destroy or damage property, possession of firearms by a person convicted of crime, handling stolen goods, possession of an offensive weapon, speeding, dangerous driving, street racing, failing to appear in court and,” Rico recoiled away slightly from the file, “What’s this? Murder?”

“ _Justifiable_ murder.” Mikasa corrected.

Rico gave her an incredulous look over the top of the file. “Is that what they call it nowadays? Is that why you have a filled teardrop on your finger?”

Mikasa’s face darkened. “Well, when you shoot a man about to kill the wife he abused for years, it’s generally considered justified. Especially after he shoots at you. And yes.”

“And you managed to convince a judge and jury that it was justifiable?”

“That does tend to happen when the alley security camera catches everything, the woman you saved testifies for you and the cops find the bullets that were meant for you lodged in the building behind you.”

“Then why did you go to prison? You’re an enforcer, highly respected within the gang. They didn’t bail you out?” She pointed at the five dots on Mikasa’s inner left wrist.

“Bail wasn’t an option. Usually is, but my father’s black and my mother is,” she took a breath, “was Japanese. Do the math.”

Hanji spoke up. “What would happen if, let’s say, you left the gang to take on another job?”

“If they found you? Torture leading to eventual death. The last person who tried to desert the Sixth Street Brawlers lasted around 48 hours.”

Hanji and Rico shared a look, and Hanji continued with their train of thought.

“Have you had thoughts of leaving the gang?”

Mikasa looked down at her hands. “Always do. I wanted to be a cop like Rico, but leaving the gang is a death wish. And I didn’t have much of a choice when I joined."

Hanji shot her a questioning look, and Mikasa looked down and sighed. "It was either me or my brother. He's too hot headed, too quick to get into a fight. He’s not Asian in any way shape or form and he tried to get into an exclusively Asian gang like the ass he is. He would've gotten himself killed and I made a promise to look after him. I kept that promise and I still intend to."

“If we help you leave the gang, protect the identity of you and any possible family members from the gang, and protect your identity from the general public because you have powers like most of the small team here so far, will you be interested in giving your loyalty to us?”

Mikasa actually sat on the thought for a few minutes, lost in her own thoughts. “What am I giving my loyalty to?”

“We’re starting a team of people with powers to show the world that we’re not feared and that we can do good.”

“And to do a better job of what the police and government should be doing.” Rico added in.

“And you’ll protect _any_ family member from the gang? Will I still be able to support them financially?"

Hanji nodded. “We’ll set aside whatever funds you need. And we can fake your death if you want us to.”

“Then my loyalty is yours.”

Hanji clapped their hands together. “Fantastic! Let’s go visit Zara to see what we can do for you and get you logged in as a member of the team.” Hanji half skipped to the entrance of the medbay, making sure that Mikasa was following them. As Mikasa exited, she made sure to give Rico a dirty look. Rico returned the look and they did not break eye contact until Mikasa had walked out of the armoury completely.

As they exited into the training room, Hanji spotted Ymir and Christa practicing with their powers: at this, Hanji clapped enthusiastically, excited to see what they could achieve.

Christa had taken to the treadmill and had aptly shifted into a lioness, reaching speeds of 50 miles per hour with the help of an electric fan keeping her body cool so it didn’t overheat.

“That’s Christa. She’s a shapeshifter! I’ve seen her shift into cats and dogs and so many other animals it’s so amazing!”

Ymir, however, was attacking a punching bag with her fists encased in fire. A plume of smoke exited her fists every time Ymir struck, causing the fire to snuff out. Ymir was struggling to keep her fire consistent and ongoing.

“And that’s Ymir. She hasn’t had much training with her fire, but I can see the potential in her!”

Mikasa blanched at the sight of the fire, nearly vomiting again. Hanji, not realising what was the cause was, looked worriedly at Mikasa. “Do you need to go back to the medbay?”

“No.” Mikasa replied firmly. “Don’t worry about it. Let’s just get to Zara.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 0821 HOURS, 28TH AUGUST 2011**

Mikasa was barely awake when she stumbled into the kitchen. She wouldn’t even be awake at this hour if it weren’t for various gang members, including the boss, texting her and asking where she was yesterday. It only took half an hour to reassure them that she was just taking a personal day and will be back by the end of the month. While she did feel bad for lying, and partially scared of the results if she was caught lying, Mikasa reminded herself that she is finally getting out of the gang and that she’s finally able to do something good in her life. Mikasa will be finally able to be called something else other than a criminal or a thug.

With a bowl of cereal in her good hand, Mikasa walked past the bench Ymir and Christa were sitting at and took a seat opposite Zara and Petra. Zara was fiddling with a computer tower instead of actually eating his breakfast, and Petra was quietly eating her own cereal.

“Good morning Mikasa!” Greeted Petra when she looked up. “Did you sleep well?”

“I did, thank you. Good morning to you both.” When Zara grunted in return, Mikasa remembered what she was going to ask him. “A lot of the members of the Sixth Street Brawlers texted me today. Including the boss. They were worried I was dead or simply left the gang. I may need a new phone when I die.”

“Got it all covered.” Zara said, not even looking in the direction of Mikasa. “Don’t worry -- it’s not the first time I’ve staged a death.”

“So how _are_ we going to stage my death?”

"I thought of this one.” Petra said, raising her hand. “We have arranged to use a corpse that matches your characteristics quite closely.”

Mikasa looked mildly alarmed. “Where did you even get a corpse like that from?”

Rico nodded in Zara’s direction after they sat down next to Mikasa. “Ask him.”

Zara simply shrugged. Mikasa raised her eyebrows and held her hands up. “On second thoughts, I’d rather not know.”

"Don't worry, she was not a very nice lady at all. And already dead."

“Okay then.” Mikasa’s gaze flicked back to Petra. “What’s next?”

“We want to use your garage for this part. It’s more isolated and we’ll have a much smaller chance of hurting innocent people.” When Mikasa gave a nod of approval, Petra clapped her hands together.

“Good! We’ll fully fill one of the bigger cars with gas then leave it running so we get the carbon monoxide going. Rico will rig your blowtorch to turn on after we leave and that should give us a massive explosion and a fire. After the fire department puts it out, all that’s left should be a charred skeleton and it will give the medical examiner a hard time with identification. Assuming they don’t rule it as accidental and actually bother, that is. I’ve removed all the teeth and shattered them, so we’ll scatter them around the garage before we leave. I burnt off all the fingerprints too just in case.”

Mikasa nodded slowly. “That’s… also a thorough idea.”

Ymir cocked her head and studied Mikasa’s expression. “Scared of fire?”

“What makes you say that?” Mikasa’s tone was almost cutting.

Ymir was unfazed and simply continued to stare. “You hesitated and tensed up. You also flinched away when you saw me practice with my fire, but not when Christa growled when she was running as a lioness."

Mikasa shot her an annoyed look. “No. I’m not talking about it.”

Ymir simply held up her hands in surrender. “Fine by me, _krigare_.”

Petra cleared their throat loudly to bring everyone back on topic. “That should hopefully look like an accidental death and we can also get your things out with no questions asked. You’ll be presumed dead by your gang so they won’t come looking for you unless they spot you on the streets. You should also take note of all the equipment that you need and we can get new ones for you.”

Mikasa nodded slowly and swallowed her food before answering. “I’m not going to come up with anything better anytime soon, so let’s do this and kill me.”

Rico clapped their hands together. “Good! We should be ready to fake your death tomorrow night, then Zara will make up fake documents and other things for a relative that does not exist. We can grab your possessions in around a week.”

“There are guys watching my building pretty much all day everyday so you’ll have to look and act pretty convincing to pull this off.”

At this point, Hanji walked in looking like they’d ran through a bush backwards. Petra sighed at this and patted the space next to her.

"I'll pick the lock to the removals place at night and grab a few uniforms and other things so we look the part. A walk in the park for me.” Rico said.

"We'll take everything out. And I really do mean everything, even your furniture.” Hanji nodded in the direction of the living room before yawning. “One of the coffee tables has three legs and is propped up on a pile of my books. I want those back. They’re my haematology books."

“And you’ll get those back, don’t worry.” Petra gently rubbed Hanji’s back, and Hanji responded by smiling and resting their upper body on the table. “And it’s shower day for you. Don’t think I ever forget when your shower days are.”

Quickly finishing off her cereal, Petra stood up and hauled Hanji off the table into a standing position.

“But _Petra_ ,” Hanji began to whine, “I have to help Zara with his blood ID system!”

“Don’t use me as an excuse!” Zara objected. “Even I have time for showers, and I’ve practically become a hermit.”

“That’s implying that you weren’t a hermit already.” Rico added.

Zara stared daggers into Rico. Petra looked between them both and exited, dragging Hanji along.

“ _Petra_ ,” Hanji started, but Petra interrupted them.

“You need to shower. You smell like gunpowder, sweat and month old milk.” Petra turned to Hanji. “Please?”

“The month old milk wasn’t my fault. It exploded on me.” Hanji paused, remembering the incident before snapping back to the present. “But that wasn’t what I was going to say!” Petra didn’t say anything else, so Hanji continued. “All I wanted to say that I really appreciate what you do for me. Like making sure I have showers and making sure I eat and sleep and you always listen to me talking about science and you support it and you support me and we’ve only been doing something like this for three weeks,” Hanji took a breath, “and that we’re really busy and don’t spend much time together but I really appreciate you even though sometimes I look like I don’t care but I care a lot! But I probably don’t show it in a way you recognise.”

Hanji finally looked towards Petra, who had a brilliant smile that made Hanji grin in return.

“Thank you,” Petra took a hold of Hanji’s hand. “I appreciate you too.” She leaned up to kiss Hanji’s cheek, but pulled away when she got a whiff of Hanji. “You still need a shower though, you still smell rotten despite the sweet things you just said.”

“ _Petra_ ,” Hanji whined again, this time allowing Petra to drag them along to the shower block.

**OUTSIDE OF MIKASA’S GARAGE, SOMEWHERE IN ALBANY, 2251 HOURS, 29TH AUGUST 2011**

Mikasa slowly pulled up to the gate that lead up to her garage and took a deep breath. Petra reassuringly put her hand on Mikasa’s forearm and spoke up.

“You can call it off at any time you know. We can always find an alternative route.”

Mikasa, still looking dead ahead at the empty road, took another breath and shook her head. “I don’t think there is an alternative route. I’m dead either way.”

“Whenever you’re ready, Mikasa. Even though we’ve got a twenty minute window.”

Just as Mikasa was about to get out of the vehicle, a man exited the garage, lighting up a cigarette. Ymir cursed.

“Don’t worry, that’s only Katashi. He helps me around the garage. Wait here.” Without giving anyone a chance to object, Mikasa climbed out of the vehicle and strolled towards Katashi.

“Katashi! Hey!” Mikasa called out once she was close enough, tugging the collar of her jacket up further to fight off the cold. “Aren’t you supposed to be quitting?”

Mikasa’s voice startled the man, making him nearly drop his cigarette.

“Boss! I thought you were--”

“Taking a personal? Yeah, but I got bored and I wanted to do something with my hands. It’s hard to have a normal day when you’re used to street fights and drug trafficking.”

“I understand you. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to go back to a standard mechanic’s job.”

Mikasa grinned. “That’s the spirit.”

“Hey! Boss!” He proffered his cigarette pack towards Mikasa. “Want one?”

“Sure. Why the fuck not.” Taking one, she allowed Katashi to light her up before taking a long drag, blowing the smoke out into the cold air. “You know what? You’ve been doing good. Take the night, I can handle whatever you started.”

“You sure boss?”

“You’re a Brawler aren’t you? Go to the club where _Bosu_ hangs. Tell him I’ll be back by the end of the month and get drunk on behalf of me. You’ve worked hard for the past month, you earned it.”

“Seriously?”

“You have five seconds before I change my mind.”

“I’m fucking gone. Thanks, boss!” With his cigarette still in his mouth, Katashi ducked back into the garage for his coat before darting off again.

As soon as he was out of sight, Mikasa stubbed out her cigarette on the wall, taking care to not damage the butt where her DNA was.

“We’re all clear,” Mikasa stated as soon as she got back to the vehicle. Moving back to the trunk, Mikasa pulled up the door to reveal a black sack that stunk to high heaven: with one hand, she pulled the corpse up and out, being careful not to hit the corpse on anything.

While Petra, Ymir and Rico pulled on leather gloves, shoe covers and hats to cover their hair, Hanji leaned against the car. “Everyone’s in position. Christa and Zara are manning the cameras back at the base, and I’m going to keep look out. We’ve got about ten minutes.”

“Alright. Let’s go kill Mikasa.” Ymir clapped her hands together. “I’ve never staged a death before, this is a fuckin’ first and a half.”

Putting the black sack on the ground and tugging up the roller door with her bare hand, Mikasa entered and spotted a vehicle that would be perfect for the job.

“We’re rigging that Hummer there.” Going to the desk at the back of the brightly lit room, she pulled the appropriate keys of the hook and unlocked it. “Rico, the blowtorches are next to the power tools,” she pointed to the stack of drawers on the right of the garage before pulling off her second glove. Mikasa was not going to give the investigators an inch of doubt that she isn’t the corpse and began to proceed to leave fresh fingerprints everywhere.

“The bastard always liked to overcompensate.” Mikasa mumbled to herself as she pulled herself into the Hummer, making sure to touch various places before allowing Petra to position the corpse.

“Are we all ready and done?”

Rico fired up the blowtorch and positioned the device. “I’m done.” Rico swiftly left.

Mikasa cast one last look around her beloved garage and exited after Petra. Ymir turned the key in the car's transmission and watched it purr to life before exiting, shutting the roller door behind her and hurrying to catch up to the other three.

Hanji was already waiting by the car when they arrived and they all clambered in, eager to get out of the cold. Mikasa settled into the driver’s seat and let out a small laugh. "Levi is going to be so annoyed over his car being trashed."

"Who's Levi?" Ymir asked as she buckled herself in. “Oi Rico, mind moving your chair forward a little? There’s barely any room back here and my legs aren’t as short as yours.”

"Opposing enforcer for a rival gang we tentatively forged an alliance with. He was the best enforcer and street fighter before I came around." Mikasa smirked. “I wish I photographed his reaction when I beat his winning streak. It was glorious.”

“And he let you work on his car?”

“Well, he wanted a secret compartment and I’m the one who does it best.”

“Secret compartment? For what?”

Mikasa shrugged. “He didn’t say. He was very specific about his opening sequence though.” She put the car into gear and stopped for a moment. “How long until the garage explodes?”

Rico checked their watch. “A minute.”

Mikasa swore under her breath. “Hang on.” The occupants of the car barely had any time to hold onto something before they were all jerked backwards into their seats as Mikasa tore out of the parking spot and down the street. When Mikasa took a corner at a ridiculous speed, Ymir spoke up in a panicked voice.

“You know brakes are a thing that exist in cars, right?”

MIkasa grit her teeth and swerved around another corner. “Those are for people who have time.”

“Traffic laws are something that exist too, you asshole!” Hanji glanced over at Ymir and noticed how she was growing quite pale.  

Skidding onto another street, Mikasa shifted gears and briefly shot Ymir a slightly annoyed look. “Do you want to get out of here alive or are you looking to become human flavoured jam?”

“Keep your eyes on the fuckin’ road!” Ymir screeched, pressing herself further backwards against her seat and gripping onto her seatbelt for dear life.

“Relax, the Sixth Street Brawlers have the best street racers in this city, and I am- was, the best in the gang. I know what I’m doing.”

Mikasa tore into another street, using the handbrake to flick the car into a parking spot on the side of the road: seconds later, a tremendous explosion was heard as fire lit up the sky in front of them.

“Congratulations! You’re dead!” Hanji remarked.

Rico checked their watch. “Not bad for someone who completely wrecked their arm. You’re going to feel that later. You may be out of a sling but you’re not out of the healing stages.”

“I’m dead, I don’t think the laws of healing apply to me anymore.” Mikasa shot back at Rico.

“Okay, as much as I find the bickering between you two funny,” Ymir started, “I’d like to get out of here before the Brawlers start crawling up my ass.”

Mikasa silently put the vehicle back into gear and pulled out of the space they slid into, ready to leave her life behind once and for all.

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 1045 HOURS, THE NEXT DAY**

Petra found Mikasa sitting on one of the benches in the training room, her hands clenched together tight enough that her knuckles were white. Behind Mikasa stood Ymir and Christa, who were training Ymir’s fire powers.

Ymir grinned and closed her eyes for a few moments. Letting out a deep breath, she waved both hands through the air and two streams of fire followed their path. The heat was already so intense that Christa had to take a step back out of discomfort. Ymir grit her teeth and held the flame steady until it slowly died down. Christa stopped the timer and patted Ymir on the shoulder, who had bent over panting from the exertion.

“Two minutes! This is a major improvement!”

Ymir straightened up again and pushed sweaty hair out of her eyes. “Two minutes is _nothing_. I bet I can do it for longer.”

Petra changed her point of focus from Ymir to Mikasa, taking a seat next to her.

“How’s your arm?”

Mikasa looked down at her arm and twisted it so her palm was facing up. “It’s completely fine now. Rico’s a good healer and I heal at a slightly quicker rate too.”

“You’re actually getting along with Rico now?”

“No, they’re still acting like I’ve done them wrong even though I’ve never met her or seen her in my entire life. Still a prick. Not going to forgive them for attacking me for no other reason other than being part of a gang.”

Patting Mikasa’s thigh, Petra felt bad for the way Rico was treating Mikasa, but knew there was nothing she could do outside talking to Rico. “I’ll have a talk with them later. But if you don’t mind my asking, is there a reason why you flinch when Ymir is using her powers? Because it’s going to be a problem if we’re working as a team.”

There was a beat of silence before Mikasa answered in a strained voice. “My-- I was in a house fire.”

Sensing Mikasa’s discomfort and hesitation to open up, Petra backed off. “I know I’m still a stranger at this point, but if you need to talk about anything, I’m always here to listen.” Petra patted the other woman’s arm gently, making the corners of Mikasa’s lips quirk upwards slightly.

“I’ll keep that in mind. Thank you.”

The two of them sat in comfortable silence for a few minutes and Mikasa opened her mouth to say something, but she was interrupted by a horrible screeching sound was coming from outside the back of the base. They both twisted to stare in the direction of the vehicle hangar and the sound stopped for a few seconds before loudly resuming.

"Zara, what on earth is the awful sound?" Petra inquired out loud. Zara’s voice came over the intercom after a brief pause.

"Hanji’s got a surprise for Mikasa." Both Mikasa and Petra looked at each other with slight alarm and got up to see what Zara had meant.

Jogging back out to the far side of the hangar, they threw open the doors doors and was greeted with the sight of half a freight train rolling along the ground. Mikasa looked over to Petra, giving her a questioning look but was answered with Petra’s confused expression.

"Ah! You're here! I knew Zara would understand!" Hanji waved enthusiastically and beckoned for them to come closer.

Mikasa gave the carriages a once over as she approached Hanji warily. "I've never been gifted with a train before, so this is a first."

Hanji gave another great heave and the train screeched to a stop beside Mikasa. They held up a finger and bent over slightly, pushing their sweaty fringe off their forehead. "They're weights!" Hanji panted out, clearly proud of what they found.

Mikasa took a second look at the vehicles. “I’m supposed to bench press those?”

Hanji nodded enthusiastically. “I saw you looking at the weights we had and figured that it wouldn’t be enough for you. So I passed that yard a few blocks away and ah, _liberated_ them of these.”

“That… might work, actually.” Mikasa approached a freight car and put a hand on the side.

“We’ll take the wheels off so it’s closer to the ground. You might be able to lift it higher if we do.”

Mikasa nodded absentmindedly and walked to the back of the car. Bracing her feet wide apart, she lifted one end of the car above her head, holding it there for a few seconds before dropping it. It crashed back to the ground loudly and Mikasa rubbed her hands together.

“That’s quite heavy. Around 20 tonnes maybe.”

Hanji looked surprised at this. “I would have thought this was easy for you. You pushed an entire train back onto the tracks.”

“Adrenaline makes me a hell of a lot stronger than I usually am.” She gestured at the freight train. “This is usually what I can handle.” Turning back to Hanji, she gave them a sincere smile. “Thank you for this.”

Hanji nodded in acknowledgement. “I’ll build some scaffolds and frames so you can have a lateral pull machine and a diagonal pull down machine. Maybe some other stuff too if I figure it out.” Hanji scratched their chin and twisted to look at the carriages. “We’ll need to use small cars and vehicles like that to avoid making the frames ridiculously large. We also don’t have any welding tools yet but I think Ymir wouldn’t mind helping. She’s quite eager to develop her powers now that she has better control over them.”

“What am I helping with?”

All three of them turned to see Ymir walking towards them with a raised eyebrow and a half eaten sandwich.

“Welding!”


	5. Close Calls

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 0930 HOURS, 5TH SEPTEMBER 2011**

Christa’s leg would not stop bouncing. Her first memory session with Hanji was about to begin and she watched them walk around their makeshift lab, turning off machines to reduce noise and the amount of distractions. Clenching her hands together, she silently wished that she had accepted Ymir’s offer for her to sit in for moral support. While it was a good idea, Christa was sure that she would spend the entire time unwilling to cooperate as much in order to make sure that Ymir wasn’t too distressed.

A comforting hand on her shoulder snapped Christa out of her thoughts, and she looked up to see Hanji sitting on a rickety chair opposite to her. “Are you ready?” They asked in a concerned tone. “I mean, we don’t have to start it now if you’re uncomfortable with it.”

Christa shook her head fiercely. “No, I’ll be fine.”

Hanji studied Christa’s expression for a few more moments before nodding. “Okay, let’s start then. Are you comfortable?”

Christa leaned back into the soft cushions of the armchair that Hanji had dragged into their lab and nodded.  

“Good. Are you scared?”

Christa shook her head, and Hanji smiled before continuing. “Good! That’ll make things easier. When our minds connect, I need you not to resist. Just let it happen. Once that’s done, I need to sift around a little to find those memories and you can examine them once I’ve done that.”

“Sounds easy almost.”

“It will be for you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Nothing that will concern you. Just concentrate on your memories and I’ll do the rest.”

Christa narrowed her eyes warily but cleared her thoughts and closed her eyes, allowing Hanji to enter her mind. At first, Hanji found Christa’s mind almost dizzying as it shifted from the blur of browns to crystal clear whites, to humming pinks to the silence of blues to painfully bright yellows; predatory reds leapt into gentle greens and the kindness that radiated from every corner left a sweet aftertaste in Hanji's mouth.

Hanji felt Christa dip into the murky memories tentatively, but as she grew bolder, she began to slip in quicker until she was completely submerged. The telepath unconsciously gritted their teeth and tightened the mental supports, preventing Christa from falling in uncontrollably and potentially something catastrophic from happening.

Christa fervently sifted through the dark mess and Hanji withdrew slightly to give her as much privacy as they could allow. As time went on, Hanji could feel Christa become more and more agitated, and holding onto her was becoming quite an effort.

When Christa’s anger began to flare as she found herself struggling to discover more about herself, Hanji pulled them both out of her mind carefully and quickly. Christa jerked upright and inhaled sharply as Hanji brought her out and severed their connection. She swayed slightly in her seat and would have pitched forward and onto the floor if Hanji hadn’t immediately caught hold of her and guided her to lean against the back of the chair again.

“Wh-- why did..”

“Shhh, slowly.” Hanji said. “Catch your breath and let your mind clear first.”

Christa nodded and took a few deep breaths. “R… Reins? Renz?” She questioned, rubbing her temples and willing the pounding in her head to go away. “I don’t think it’s accurate, but it’s still pretty close.”

“Renz is a German surname, if I’m not mistaken.” Hanji pointed out. Christa nodded, but gave no other reply and simply stared at the floor between her feet.

“Did you hear anything about your first name? I was focusing on not letting you slip at that stage, so I wasn’t paying a lot of attention to what was happening.”

Christa shook her head. “Only the surname, and even that’s hazy.”

Hanji covered one of Christa’s hands with their own. “For a first session and one of the very few times I’ve actually had permission to dig through someone’s memories, this was a success.”

The blonde snorted quietly. “I think I was expecting to just… recover years and years of stuff and not just a version of my last name that I’m pretty sure is not even correct.”

Hanji nodded. “I thought so. I apologise for not explaining that you won’t be able to handle such large chunks at a time. Next time, start with small things first, like your first name. As we do more sessions and you grow more comfortable, you’ll be able to pick out the larger memories.”

Christa nodded tiredly. “Are we going to continue?”

The telepath shook their head. “You’re too drained, and I can feel your headache from here.”

“But I can sti--”

“No,” Hanji interrupted, “You’re tired, and in pain. You won’t be able to last as long as you did before and I can’t guarantee that I can pull us both out in time when you’re in this state. We can continue tomorrow.”

The blonde looked slightly displeased, but understood Hanji’s reasoning and nodded. “Okay. Tomorrow, same time?”

“Yes. I suggest you go and eat something and perhaps take a nap afterwards. It’ll probably get rid of that headache.”

Christa got to her feet unsteadily. “Thanks for doing this.”

Hanji nodded and watched the blonde shuffle out of their lab before they leaned over and rested their elbows on their knees. That short session took more energy than Hanji liked, and was starting to regret not sleeping more the previous night. They sat quietly for a while, rubbing their temples until a loud growl from their stomach prompted them to get to their feet heavily and lumber out of their lab.

They walked past the living room and paused to smile at the image of Ymir leaning against Christa’s large wolf body. Christa was making a satisfied humming noise as Ymir scratched her behind the ears and laid her head on her furry neck. Ymir looked up from Christa and spotted Hanji observing them.

“How’re you doing? Christa’s pretty out of it so I can’t really imagine how you’re holding up.”

Hanji shrugged. “I’ve been better, but today’s session went quite well all things considered so I cannot really complain.”

Ymir nodded slowly. “Make sure you get some rest too ‘cause you look like you haven’t slept in a week.”

“I will. You make sure Christa doesn’t overexert herself today too.”

Ymir snapped into a lazy salute. “Aye aye, commander.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 1707 HOURS, 7TH SEPTEMBER 2011**

Hanji groaned quietly, eyeing the flickering lights above them and pulled a cushion over their face. A headache had started off as a mildly irritating but easily ignored pain in the mid afternoon, but had slowly grown to something that resembled an intense migraine. To make matters worse, all the lights and electronics in the base had been flickering all day, and no one had any idea why.

Hanji was snapped out of their hazy thoughts when they felt a gentle hand on their shoulder. They looked up blearily to see Petra offering them a glass of water, a bottle of painkillers and a small bowl of white rice. “It’s been five hours, you can take more now.”

Sitting up and gratefully accepting the medication, Hanji downed two tablets and the entire glass of water before quickly working their way through the rice. When they were finished, Petra took the glass and bowl from Hanji and watched worriedly as the telepath sunk back into the cushions. She leaned down to kiss their forehead and began to rub the back of their neck gently. “No fever. And you’re not sweaty or clammy or anything?”

Hanji nodded in confirmation, eyes sliding shut automatically at the pleasant sensation. “I’m not overloading either. And these flickering lights aren’t helping. I would turn them off but I don’t really want to get off this couch.”

At this, Petra stood from the couch to turn the lights in the living room off. Hanji immediately sighed in relief.

Petra sat back down next to them and resumed her massage. "I wish there was more I could do for you."

Hanji hesitated for a moment. "There might be something you can do."

"Anything." Petra’s reply was immediate, and it made Hanji smile slightly at her eagerness.

“Can we link minds? You always have a calming effect on me and this might make it less painful."

Petra smiled and leaned forward to touch their foreheads together. "Of course we can."

Hanji sighed in relief and brought a hand up to gently cup Petra’s cheek. "Are you ready?"

Petra nodded slightly and Hanji closed their eyes, letting their mind wander. Petra gave a small gasp and slid closer as their minds connected and Hanji’s grip on her cheek tightened slightly at the wonderful landscape of Petra’s mind.

"Is it helping?" Petra eventually asked. Hanji nodded wordlessly and chuckled at the colours and thoughts that flashed through their partner's mind. It felt like they were being slowly submerged in liquid sunlight.

A brief childhood memory flickered across the forefront of Petra’s mind, and Hanji caught a glimpse of vast green fields and being held protectively by a smiling woman with very familiar dark red hair and golden eyes. "You look very much like your mother." Hanji remarked.

Petra swallowed thickly and tentatively recalled another memory of her mother. Hanji knew what happened, so they had a feeling that Petra treasured these memories a great deal and sharing them this was a privilege. They both sat leaning against each other in silence, trading and reliving memories together before Rico trudged in wearily. Hanji, who was close to falling asleep thanks to Petra’s ministrations, cracked open an eye at her arrival. Rico glanced at the couch and made a move to exit quietly, but was stopped by Hanji’s voice.

“Did you find out what’s wrong?” Hanji noticed that sometime in the past fifteen minutes, Petra had unconsciously slung her legs over their thighs and that their hand had moved down to clutch Petra’s shoulder. Their faces were so close together that one of them only needed to tilt their head and they would be kissing.

Rico shook her head. “I’ve checked everything at least five times and I’ve got nothing. Zara can’t find anything either so whatever’s causing this, it’s not on this base.” She paused for a moment to study Hanji’s ashen appearance. “Still getting worse?”

Hanji shook their head slightly. “I could feel my heartbeat in my head fifteen minutes ago.” They smiled and nudged Petra’s nose with their own. “Petra’s helping more than all the painkillers I've had all day put together."

Rico made a sympathetic noise and nodded. “That’s good. But I think you’re going to need to just sleep this one off.”

The lights flickered once again and Hanji’s delicate concentration slipped and broke, wincing at the abrupt disconnection from Petra’s mind.

“Again?” Rico exclaimed in frustration. Groaning, Hanji stood up from the couch slowly and began to walk towards the door with the intention of going down to visit Zara.

“Seriously if this keeps flickering we’re going to have to call someone to fi--”

This time, the lights went out completely and a flash of white hot pain erupted from Hanji’s skull and shot down their spine, making their knees buckle. Both Rico and Petra's hands were under their arms in a flash and together, they hauled Hanji over to a couch.

“Hanji? Hanji, can you hear me?” Rico gently patted their cheek and Petra sat down worriedly beside them, but Hanji shook their head quickly and unsteadily got to their feet. The pain had been reduced to the previous dull ache, but now the telepath could sense an overwhelming mix of anguish, physical pain and hopelessness strongly emanating from somewhere outside the base.

“Rico, come with me.” Hanji pressed the heel of their hand to their forehead and focused. The pain shot through their head again and they winced, but ignored Rico and Petra’s worried questions.

“There’s no time! Come on, we have to find them!”

Not bothering to wait, Hanji stumbled to the front door and fell against it, almost tripping over as it opened. Rico caught them again and slung one arm over her shoulder, hauling them to the gate before stopping.

“Which direction?” Hanji waved a hand to the left and Rico grunted, shifting Hanji’s weight before half-dragging the telepath along the footpath.

They rounded a corner and Rico opened her mouth again to ask but Hanji shushed her urgently.

“Did you hear that?”

They both fell silent and another quiet moan was heard, followed by a brief flash of pain shooting across Hanji’s skull. Rico let go of them and moved over to the row of dumpsters. She paused for a moment to peer behind them.

“Oh my God.” She gasped before hurriedly dragging several out of the way.

A woman lay curled up on the ground, white static sparking off her skin. Judging from her pallor, cracked lips, gaunt frame and bloodshot eyes, Hanji could tell that they had found the source of the pain. At the sudden change in brightness, the woman threw her hands up to shield her eyes and gasped again as an arc of electricity crackled over her skin, making her convulse harder. Hanji snapped into action and knelt down beside the woman.

“Move! Get awa--“ Her sentence was cut off by another agonised scream and Hanji jumped back just in time to avoid being electrocuted. The scream dissolved into hoarse whimpering and Rico reached out, ignoring the white energy that jumped to her hands and laid them over the stranger’s forehead and tear-stained cheek. The stranger let out a pained groan but the convulsions died down almost immediately.

“She’s severely dehydrated and probably going into shock. If we do something to help, we have to do it now.” Rico urged. Hanji looked back to the woman and made up their mind.

Stretching out their hands, Hanji touched the woman’s sweaty temples with two fingers and she gasped.

“What are you doing?” The woman didn’t have the energy to push Hanji’s hands out of the way.

“Just relax, we’re going to help you.” Hanji murmured quietly. The stranger’s eyes widened.

“I don’t want your help!”

Hanji shook their head. “You need it. Relax.”

With that, Hanji closed their eyes and focused. The stranger’s eyes stared right into the sky and she struggled weakly against Rico’s grip briefly before growing limp.

Rico hurriedly gathered the stranger up in her arms and began to jog back to the base. Feeling the dull throb leave their head, Hanji sighed and rubbed their temples briefly before standing up and chasing after Rico.

\----------

It was well past midnight before Hanji walked back into the medbay, their headache completely gone. Rico had transferred the woman onto one of the beds and hooked her up to a saline drip. She had also treated the small electrical burns that dotted the stranger’s skin and Hanji noted the peculiar markings that started from the backs of her hands and extended all the way up her arms.

“Are those tattoos?” Hanji enquired, gesturing at the markings. Rico looked down and shook her head.

“I think they’re lichtenberg figure scars. Don’t know whether it’s from her powers or if she was hit by lightning. Could be both.”

Hanji ran their eyes over the stranger’s slim face. “How is she doing?” They asked softly.

Rico sighed tiredly and adjusted her grip on the stranger’s bare arm. “Better. Her vitals look stable and I’ve had skin to skin contact with her for the last half an hour. I don't know when she'll wake up because she was severely exhausted.”

Hanji looked down at the stranger. She looked unhealthily thin, as if she had lost a large amount of weight in a very short period of time. Her long hair was limp and lifeless and even with Rico’s healing touch, she was still sickly pale.

“How long would she have held on for if we didn’t find her?”

Rico glanced down at the still figure. “Honestly, not longer than two or three days."

“Is she wearing some kind of uniform?” The stranger’s clothes were filthy and burnt away in some places, but Hanji could just make out some kind of patch on the shirt.

“Certainly looks like it.”

Hanji nodded and pulled a chair out to sit next to the bed. Another half an hour passed before the stranger groaned quietly, eyelids fluttering open. Hazy and unfocused eyes landed on Hanji for a moment before the fog cleared, and the stranger sprang upright.

“Whoa, whoa.” Rico laid a firm hand on her shoulder. “You’ll dislodge your IV.”

The stranger recoiled away from Rico’s touch. “Where am I?” She asked, clearly panicked. “Who are you?”

Hanji could see white static on her skin so they jumped in. “We found you behind a dumpster, remember? You were in a bad condition, so we brought you back here to take care of you. Don’t worry, you’re safe.”

“And why did you do that?” Icy eyes bore into Hanji’s, and they had to look away uncomfortably.

Seeing this, Rico rested her forearms on the edge of the bed and leaned forward to draw the stranger’s attention to her.

“We know what it’s like to lose control of your powers.”

The woman’s gaze flickered between the two of them confusedly. “You’re both powered?”

Rico nodded slowly. “My friend here has telepathy and telekinesis”, She said, gesturing at Hanji. “I have weapon proficiency and healing skills.” The stranger eyed Hanji suspiciously, so they tilted their head to the side and a plastic cup levitated off the surface of the desk. The stranger stared at it for a few moments then flicked her eyes to the medbay’s open door to look at the large rack of shotguns that were visible.

“You’re the first people that I’ve met who have powers.” The stranger observed, looking down at her clasped hands.

Both Hanji and Rico nodded. “Is there anyone we can contact for you? Anywhere you would like to go back to?”

The stranger scoffed. “I overloaded the entire Russian consulate building and another four blocks two weeks ago. Everyone knows. And I really have no desire to see any remaining family that I have ever again.”

“Consulate? You’re an official?”

“No, I just work at there as a security guard.”

Hanji shifted uncomfortably, not knowing what to do or say. Luckily, Rico picked up on this. “Well, can you at least tell us your name?” She asked gently.

The stranger studied her for a few moments, her gaze lingering over Rico’s blind eye before answering slowly. “Annie.”

“We can help you. We can help control your powers and help you understand how to use them properly. Keep you safe.”

Annie opened her mouth to argue but paused for a long moment. “And what’s the catch?”

“Nothing. You can stay here and we can help you take control of your powers. After you feel that you are in control, you can leave us and you don’t need to give us anything in return.” Annie’s eyes flashed with hope for a second before she recollected herself, slipping back into an expressionless mask.

Hanji took a deep breath. “If you do leave us, we need to ah… alter your memory of your time here a bit.”

Annie straightened up and opened her mouth to reply but was cut off by Hanji. “It’s not anything serious! I’ll just tweak your memories a little bit so you don’t remember our faces, names or where this place is. You’ll still retain everything you’ve learnt.”

“Why are you offering to help me? You don’t know me at all.”

“Because we can, and will. You shouldn’t be punished just because you have a skill that nobody wants or cares to understand.”

Annie nodded slowly in understanding but her shoulders slumped. “Controlling my power is only half of the problem.”

Hanji cocked their head to the side and shot the blonde woman a questioning look. “What do you mean?”

Annie laughed bitterly. “I’ve got nowhere to go. I know the government put me as a high alert defect, so that means that they’re not going to stop looking for me for a long time and every law enforcement agency in this country probably has been told to keep a lookout for me. And as an added bonus, I’ll probably end up as a human lab rat for the rest of my life. I can’t even shower or drink more than a few sips of any liquid because I’ll fucking electrocute myself.”

Hanji opened and closed their mouth a few times, unsure of what to say. “Is there anywhere you can go, anyone you can go to who is willing to help you?”

Annie shook her head and the three of them were silent, trying to think of a solution to the issue.

An idea occurred to Hanji. “We… might be able to help with that as well.”

“What do you mean?”

“If you are willing, there is something that you can do.” Annie raised an eyebrow and waited for them to continue.

“We’re putting together a team of people with powers. Show the world that we don’t need to be feared, that we can help. We’ll help you control your powers, think of different ways to use them, train you, give you a job, give you a home.”

Annie held Hanji’s gaze and Hanji resisted the strong urge to look away. “You’re creating a superhero team.” Both Hanji and Rico nodded. “And you are willing to help me train my powers, then join your little Birds of Prey team.”

“Actually we’re more Justice League.” Rico corrected.

“We’ll eventually have a much better name than that.” Hanji offered weakly. Annie shot them an incredulous look.

“And if I join your little team, how will you guarantee that no one will find out who I am?”

Hanji held up a finger and indicated for Annie to wait. They tilted their head backwards a little and looked at the back wall of the infirmary, gently loosening the restrictions on their mind and reaching out to brush against Zara’s mind. Hanji felt Zara recoil backwards and heard a yelp and a thud from the next room, indicating that she had probably fallen out of her chair in shock.

 _“Hanji, what the fuck?”_ The telepath could feel the rapid pulse of Zara’s heart and felt a little guilty for unexpectedly initiating contact with her mind.

_“I’m sorry for startling you, but could you please come into the medbay? We are in need of your expertise.”_

Hanji heard Zara sigh. _“I’ll be right there. Please get out of my head now. I installed the intercom system for a reason, you know.”_

Hanji turned their attention back to Annie, who was watching them with a highly confused expression. “Zara’s coming to help.” Hanji explained.

“Thats great?”

In Zara’s cave, Zara let out a groan while standing up. She had no idea why Hanji would use their telepathy when there was a perfectly good intercom system available. Regardless, she picked up her tablet and tapped open a few programs: she simply couldn’t just leave the work she’s done over the past few weeks unattended.

Zara wasn’t even a step into the medbay when Hanji fired off a question. “We need to make Annie disappear because the government is after her. Can you do that?”

Zara mused over this question for a few moments before shrugging. “We’ve already killed Mikasa so killing you would be a bad idea. I can just delete you off every known database and blackmail a few people who give those orders. And maybe plant a bigger but also fake threat somewhere else in the city so they spend more of their resources going after that instead of chasing you.”

“You can do that? Blackmail people easily?”

Zara began to type on the tablet. “It won’t be too difficult, to be honest. I can do it all in a couple of hours, give or take. Maybe an afternoon, I don’t know if there’s anything use as blackmail. If there isn’t I’ll just tweak a few things and send an anonymous tip that says that you’ve been seen in another state or country.”

“But you have to be sure about this. There’s no going back after Zara’s done her work.” Hanji said.

Annie eyed Zara warily again and let out a long breath, clenching her hands together tightly. “If I go back, they’ll just lock me up.” After a few moments, she straightened her back and looked at Rico and Hanji.

“I’ll stay, and I’ll join you.”

“Great! We’ll get you--”

“But,” Annie interrupted, “Any sign that you’re not actually who you say you are, I’m gone. I still don't like the fact that you went against my wishes, and I don’t care if you have some sort of Cerebro hidden away somewhere or if you can hack into every electronic device on the planet. You won’t be able to find me and if you do, I’ll kill you. Deal?”

“Deal.”

**THE NEXT MORNING**

It took Annie a few moments before she remembered why she wasn’t curled up against the cold concrete ground the next morning. Rubbing her eyes, she winced at the forgotten IV in her arm, shifted slightly and sat up. Stretching out her other arm, she noticed how the splitting pain in her head was gone and that she was only discharging static.

Heaving a long sigh, she leaned back to rest back onto the bed and pondered her complete reversal of fortune. Yesterday morning, she had woken up in agony, genuinely believing that she would die behind that dumpster and now she was lying in some sort of superhero base and had a way out of her predicament.

A rustling sound from the doorway prompted Annie to find the source of the sound. Rico strolled into the medbay, fresh out of a shower, and gave Annie a look of surprise.

“I didn’t think you would be awake so soon.”

“The lights in here are more blinding than Jesus’s asshole.”

“That’s certainly one way to put it. Sorry, I must have bumped the switch when I was heading out. How are you feeling?”

“Like I’m not going to die.”

“That’s always good. Think you can make a short trip up to the kitchens for some food?”

“I can try.”

“Good. Let me take your IV out and get you some shoes so you’re not treading on the cold floor.”

When the IV was out, Rico left the medbay once again in search for shoes. They returned five minutes later with a pair of trainers in hand. “Not as formal as what you had on, but it’ll have to do.”

“I wasn’t expecting to be on my feet so soon after the past few days.” Annie said when she had finally stood up from the bed, thankful that the trainers did fit. She took a few unsteady steps forward and Rico hovered behind her, ready to catch her if she were to fall. “I’m fine, I’m fine.”

“I was healing you almost the entire time that you were asleep after our little conversation, so I’m not surprised.”

“That confident in your abilities, are you?”

Rico gestured towards their damaged eye. “Stabbed in the eye then had strong acid splashed into the wound, and I didn’t die. Making sure you were almost back to normal wasn’t difficult.”

“But you still basically lost an eye.” Annie argued.

“I’m alive, aren’t I? Plus I’m not completely blind in this eye, so that’s an even bigger win.”

“What do you mean?”

“I can see shapes and judge light levels, but that’s about it.”

The lift screeched to a halt and Annie winced at the noise before they both stepped off and walked slowly to the dining area. Everyone was awake and was currently at various stages of eating breakfast.

“Alright everybody,” Rico began and everyone stopped what they were doing to look at them. “As you probably all know by now, we have a new member.” Turning to Annie, who was still standing behind them, they nudged her in front. “Everyone, this is Annie.”

Everyone greeted her at the same time and a small blonde sitting at a bench waved enthusiastically at her. A ginger haired woman wiped her hands on a towel and hurried around the side of the kitchen bench and stopped in front of Annie.

“Good morning, and I’m glad that you’ve recovered enough to have breakfast with us! I’m Petra.”

“Annie.” She cocked her head to the side curiously. “What can you do?”

“I can turn invisible and see the future.”

“That’s an interesting combination of powers.”

Petra shrugged in response. “It works for me. You must be hungry after everything that’s happened.”

Annie nodded. “I haven’t really eaten anything in four days, so hungry is a bit of an understatement.”

“Not to worry, we have plenty of food and you can help yourself to as much as you need.”

“As long as you have cereal and toast, I’ll be okay.”

“We have a lot of different kinds of cereal because Zara likes to mix different types together before eating it, and we have plenty of bread and spreads. The toaster is over there, although you may need to give it a bit of a hit before it works properly.”

“Thanks for the tip.” Petra nodded again and excused herself, going back to cooking her breakfast.

Annie looked out at the small cluster of people sitting around and immediately picked out the three that were unfamiliar to her. The tallest of the three sat down on one of the benches next to the blonde, pausing for a moment to grin slightly at the plate in front of her piled high with food before shoveling large portions of it into her mouth. Annie could barely make out the odd scar on her neck from her current angle. An Asian looking woman sat across the table from her, half a piece of buttered toast in one hand and a folded newspaper in the other. As Annie watched, she turned a few pages, scanned its contents for a moment and laughed.

“Looks like I made the obituaries section of the newspaper.”

“What? It’s been over a week!”

The Asian woman shrugged and unfolded the newspaper to tear the page out. “I’m more surprised that this even happened. I’m keeping it.”

The woman pocketed the piece of paper and looked up to see Annie’s quizzical expression. “I’m technically dead.”

Annie nodded slowly, still confused. The other woman swung both legs over the side of the bench and stood up. She walked over to Annie and offered her hand.

“Mikasa Ackerman. Welcome to the group.”

“Annie Leonhardt.” They shook hands and when Mikasa turned to sit back at the bench, Annie couldn't help but take the opportunity to run her eyes appreciatively over the taller woman’s muscular frame.

“Checking out the menu already, are we?” The tallest of the four swallowed her mouthful of food and twisted on the seat around to look at Annie.

Petra, now carrying a full plate of food, moved over next to Annie. “The two are Ymir and Christa. Christa’s the shorter one, who shapeshifts and Ymir manipulates fire.” Petra pointed out. Annie moved and offered her hand out to the taller one.

Ymir looked at the proffered hand and back at Annie. “How do I know you’re not going to electrocute me if I shake your hand?”

Christa immediately elbowed her in the ribs and Ymir doubled over slightly, wheezing quietly. “Well how do I know that you’re not going to burn my hand?” Annie retorted.

Rubbing a hand over her ribs, Ymir inclined her head slightly. “That’s true.” She reached out and grasped Annie’s hand in a firm handshake.

Even though Annie wasn’t here to make friends, she thought it’d be better to make good with her teammates if she was going to be grouped with them.

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 0935 HOURS, 12TH SEPTEMBER 2011**

Petra watched with concern as Annie finished taping her hands. “Are you sure you’re feeling ready for this? I know we have to see how well you can defend yourself, but we have plenty of time to do that.”

“Please, I’ve been back to normal since yesterday. I’m fine. Plus, I’ve got all this energy and nothing to use it for.” Tossing the roll of tape aside, Annie lifted her fists up to her head and assumed a fighting stance.

“I’m trained to kill, are you sure about this?”

“Just hit me already, will you?”

Petra paused for a second, still looking unsure, and threw a right hook. Annie immediately dodged the blow and grabbed Petra’s wrist forcefully, using her free hand to strike her hard on the jaw before releasing her grip on Petra’s wrist briefly to grab hold of her upper arm. Seeing an opportunity, Petra stepped behind Annie and straightened up, causing the arm that the blonde still had a grip on to tighten until she had her locked in a chokehold. Annie made a choking noise briefly, her hands immediately coming up to grip Petra’s forearm before dropping to her knees and twisting her body. Petra flipped over onto her back, momentarily dazed, before lifting her arms up to protect her from Annie’s punches. When Annie paused to draw back her arm for another punch, Petra lifted her leg and kicked her hard in the stomach, causing Annie to fly backwards and hit the mat hard. Petra quickly scrambled to her feet and Annie did the same, coughing and wheezing.

As soon as her coughing stopped, Annie moved forward again, feinting a high kick that drew Petra’s guard up: Annie drove her foot with her all her weight behind it into her opponent’s waist, causing the woman to stagger sideways and hold her side with one hand.

Much to Annie’s surprise, Petra recovered almost instantly.

Quickly stepping towards Annie, Petra placed one hand on the other woman’s chest, hooking a leg behind her knee and pushed. Annie lost her balance and began to fall, but managed to grab a handful of Petra’s sleeve and yanked hard. They both began to tumble to the ground and Annie lifted her leg up and placed it against Petra’s stomach, waiting until her back had hit the ground before straightening her leg, sending the ex-Marine flying over her head and crashing into the mat on her back. They both lay there on the mats, winded and panting.

“Ugh.” Petra groaned, staring dazedly at the ceiling. “I’m going to feel that one tomorrow morning.” She sat up heavily and turned around to see Annie rubbing her throat where she had locked it in a brief chokehold.

“I thought sacrifice throws were in Judo.” Petra asked when she realised what Annie had done at the end of the fight.

“They are, I learnt it from a coworker.” Annie coughed again and doubled over, putting a hand over her diaphragm. “Didn’t have the opportunity to use it until now.”

Petra nodded and winced slightly at the motion. “Good match. You fight well.”

“You do too, now please go and see Rico. I kicked you pretty hard there and that landing would have hurt a lot too. Your jaw’s also going purple.” Annie gestured at the spectacular bruise that had started to blossom over Petra’s jaw.

“You need to see Rico as well. I kicked your diaphragm with as much force as I could put behind it.”

“I could tell.” Annie rubbed her diaphragm as she said this, coughing once more. When she finished coughing, Annie took the time to catch her breath, still feeling the brute force of Petra’s kick. Five minutes passed of them trying to regain their breath when Annie stood up to use the intercom: as she was about to press the button, Zara entered.

“Ah! Just the person I was looking for!”

“I wasn’t looking for you.”

“Tough shit. Walk with me.”

Annie spared a glance at Petra, who was still rubbing her side, and walked as quickly as she could to catch up to Zara. “Where are we going?”

“Mikasa’s in one of the hangars working out and Hanji wants me to record some data.” Locking her tablet, she waved at Petra before gesturing to Annie to leave the room. When she did, Zara began to talk again. “Anyway, it turns out that there’s not a lot to use as blackmail material, so I’m going to fake a few pictures of you in Italy or something and post it to the relevant authorities as an anonymous tip. Hopefully it’ll lead them on a wild goose chase there and if we’re careful, they’ll never know what happened to you.”

“But won’t they know it’s fake?”

“I’ve got a few private photos that I took in Italy that I can alter and the rest won’t be too difficult.” Annie still looked unconvinced, so Zara pushed her point further.

“Look, I’ve been using technology since before I could use my hands properly as a kid. I impressed MI6 so much that beat out about twenty other people who have had twice as much experience as I have and have been considered for around six months already. Even Hanji’s not entirely sure that I don’t have some sort of power related to technology. Trust me, I know what I’m doing.”

Silence passed over them as they went up the elevator and out of the base. They were halfway to Mikasa’s training hangar when Annie spoke up again.

"What was the first thing you hacked?"

"A gameboy, and I think it was Super Mario Land so I could have unlimited lives. Young me was going places."

“Alright. What do you need from me to make this work?”

“We’re going to need to take a few photos of you so I can manipulate it.” Zara pulled out her tablet again and unlocked it, opened a few folders and sifted through its contents in order to find specific set of photos. “These should do the trick for the background. If not I’m sure I can put some pressure on the people tracking you down.” When Zara heard no reply from Annie, she looked up to see that they were already in the hangar.

Zara turned her head to face Annie but found that the blonde’s attention had been diverted to somewhere else. Mikasa, who had approved of Hanji’s new weight equipment in the morning, had just stood up from one of the machines and stretched her arms above her head, giving the both of them a very pleasant view of the taut muscles of her back and arms.

"I know, Mikasa's attractive, isn't she?" Zara's voice drew Annie's stare away from Mikasa's back to Zara.

"I wasn't staring."

"I wasn't saying that you were staring." Zara had a look that she knew Annie was blatantly lying, but didn't push it further. "I'd climb her like a tree if my affections weren't laid somewhere else."

Ignoring Annie’s raised eyebrow, Zara turned to face her tablet again and started to hum as she brought up a few files. Annie glanced back at Mikasa one more time before shaking her head and directing her attention back to the plan.

“I also want to go back home and grab some of my things but there have been cops watching my building, so I haven’t had the opportunity to do that yet.”

“What are you hoping to sneak out?”

“Some important documents, clothes, electronics, a few other personal things.”

“Well you’re not trying to get your furniture out this time, so I’m sure Petra and Hanji won’t mind sneaking you in and out of your place before I send these photos out. Give her a list of things you want and she’ll organise it with Rico.”

At this point, Mikasa noticed them both and grinned. “You here for the show?”

Zara nodded. “I’m filling in for Hanji because they’re still playing with fire and Ymir.  Annie’s here because I’m making her disappear.”

Mikasa nodded towards Annie as a greeting and moved sat back down at the lateral pull down machine. Hanji and Ymir had built a scaffold and bolted it to the ground and wall. A train carriage had been attached to a pulley system and the bar that Mikasa was pulling on was thicker than Annie’s leg.

During the hour that Mikasa exercised, Zara had somehow managed to multitask Annie’s disappearing act and dutifully recorded data that Hanji had requested. Rico had even made a flying visit, checking up on Annie after hearing about the fight between her and Petra.

Now, Mikasa was drying her face on the towel, feeling the ache of a good workout. Nearby stood Annie, who was leaning against the metal frame and peering into the dilapidated carriage.

“How are you disappearing?” Mikasa asked, drawing Annie’s attention away from the carriage and to her.

“Zara’s making a set of photos that looks like I’m in Italy and sending it off to the authorities.” Annie swiftly changed the subject to something that wasn’t about her. “You mentioned something about faking your death to join this little group?”

Mikasa twisted her torso and lifted her hair to show her the red fist on her neck. “I used to be an enforcer in a gang. They would have killed me if I tried to leave so we faked my death so no one would come after me.”

“Sixth Street Brawler, huh? You a fighter?”

“One of the best in the gang. Probably had something to do with the fact that normal punches felt like nothing and the fact that I was stronger than everyone. I heard that you’re a champion fighter as well.”

“You have to get good at something if you depend on it as a source of income. And some people fight dirty.”

“Ever fight in an underground fight club?”

“No. I worked a government job and that would’ve backfired on me.”

Mikasa nodded. “I was supposed to see what you can do, but Rico and I felt that it wouldn’t be fair to pit you against someone who has enhanced condition and super strength, or against someone who can probably master every single form of martial arts in two days.”

“So I got the ex-Marine instead.”

“That’s right. Petra’s already fought you?”

“Just then. She gave me a thrashing and I gave her a thrashing. Pretty evenly matched if you ask me.”

“You okay to fight then?”

“Rico had a look at me while you were working out.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

Annie simply shrugged.

“Let’s see what you can do. I won’t hit you back because you’re probably still in pain.”

“Sure, but we’re having a match when it stops hurting.” Moving out of the way of the machines, they both assumed a fighting stance. “You ready?”

“Ready.”

Annie gave a small smirk and moved so quickly that the next thing Mikasa saw was a flash of stars across her field of vision. She staggered backwards and cursed loudly, one hand immediately shooting up to cradle the area of her face that Annie’s foot had struck.

“What did you even hit me with?”

“My foot.”

Zara, who had been watching, laughed loudly. “That was a pretty perfect kick.”

“But how did you--”

“360 roundhouse in the art style of Muay Thai.”

“That’s a fight ender right there.” Mikasa held up a finger. “I feel like my head is actually somewhere over there.”

“I did kick you pretty hard.”

“I’m alright if you’re wondering, just give me a second.” After a minute of Mikasa regaining her sense of balance, she spoke up again. “What else can you do?”

“Sambo.”

“Think you can demonstrate?”

Annie fell back into the correct stance. “I’d love to.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 2254 HOURS, 13TH SEPTEMBER 2011**

Hanji let out a breath of  frustration and telekinetically swept a slightly smoking and melted pile of material into a hazardous waste bin. They were working with Ymir to try and create a flexible and fireproof protective suit. Ymir was working tirelessly to continuously make obvious improvements over her control and what she could do with her powers, but Hanji was slowly discovering that they had not known as much how to balance flexibility with protection as they initially thought. If Ymir kept reducing Hanji’s efforts to piles of melted material at the current rate, they would have to call in some extra help.

 _"Uh, Hanji?”_ Zara’s voice made Hanji jump. Recovering quickly, they reached over and pressed the button on the radio. _“There's something you should see."_

Hanji let out a long sigh and went to rub their eyes tiredly. "I know I'm not usually the one to deny interesting things and happenings, but I've been awake for 52 hours. I’m tired and Petra’s going to give me that look again if I don’t sleep soon and I feel like I’m going to crash. Can it wait?"

_"I can’t show you over the intercom and it’ll only take a second. Just come on down.”_

Hanji rubbed their forehead and lamented silently, pushing the thought of curling up to Petra and sleeping to the back of their mind. Hanji even eyed up Zara’s bed when they entered Zara’s cave: hell, in this current state, they’d happily sleep on the floor right now.

“I can tell you in short.” Zara started, sympathising to Hanji’s situation. “That new girl, Annie? I logged her in to the security system finally, and the system started beeping at me."

Hanji stood up straighter. "Is this bad? Do we need to restrain her?"

"Let me finish. The system does this beep if I haven't filed something correctly. I wondered what was up, and I checked it.” Zara quickly pressed a few keys and two sets of DNA appeared the largest screen. Hanji only needed a brief glance to know what was coming next.

“Annie is—“

“Christa’s half-sister.” Hanji interrupted. “Probably from the same mother."

Both Hanji and Zara were silent for a few moments as they digested this new information. “So… who's going to crack the news?"

Hanji rubbed their eyes tiredly again. "I'll see if Petra is up. She's better at these sort of thing and could probably stop any of them from storming out. Can you print out the two DNA scans and bring it up to the living room? I'll go get everyone.” With that, Hanji turned on their heel and strode out of Zara’s cave. Sleep was probably not going to happen any time soon now.


	6. By Bond and By Blood

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 2305 HOURS, 13TH SEPTEMBER 2011**

"WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN RENZ IS MY HALF-SISTER?"

Petra had half expected this reaction and winced internally. "Annie, please calm down, we only just found out--"

Annie cut Petra off with a violent wave of her hand. "I've been an only fucking child in my whole entire _fucking_ life, and then you just waltz in, take me here, and announce that I'm related to _her_ by blood! This is the same person who can't even remember any of her fucking childhood!” Her voice had raised to a shout and Christa paled, sinking backwards into the couch.

At this, Ymir pushed herself off the wall angrily and stalked towards Annie with fire licking at her fingers. “Hey! Don’t you _fucking_ dare talk about that you--”

Christa shot up from her seat and wrapped a restraining hand around her girlfriend's wrist. “Ymir, please don’t," she pleaded. The taller woman stopped in her tracks but continued to glare at Annie, subtly pushing Christa behind her.

Annie threw her hands up gave a derisive laugh. “You know what? Fuck you.” She pointed at Petra. “Fuck her.” She continued, pointing at Christa, who shrunk back further behind Ymir. “Fuck everything about this. Go fuck yourselves."

With that, Annie turned and stormed out of the base, deliberately slamming the door loudly on her way out.

Standing up from the armchair, Hanji made to go after her but Petra stopped them. “Let her be. Annie probably needs to walk this off.” Hanji opened their mouth to protest but Petra cut them off. “She's just been taken out of her safe space because of circumstances out of her control and to a strange place full of strange people, and they're telling her that one of the strangers is related to her.”

“But she might do something stupid and put herself in danger.” Hanji argued. “She doesn’t have full control over her powers and the last time she lost control, it almost killed her.”

“I’ll go.” Mikasa offered, pushing herself off the wall. “I’ll go find her and make sure she doesn’t hurt herself.”

The Japanese woman picked up her scarf and Annie’s coat from the couch and jogged out of the base. Petra watched the door close gently before turning to look at Christa. She was pale, deathly quiet, and it wasn’t until Ymir laid a comforting hand on her shoulder did she jerk out of her thoughts and cling tightly to her girlfriend’s body. Ymir immediately wrapped her arms around her Christa and pressed a gentle kiss to the top of her head.

“What are you thinking, Christa?” Petra asked when the shapeshifter eventually pulled away.

Christa said nothing for a few moments, simply opening and closing her mouth repeatedly in shock. “Sister?”   

**FIVE MINUTES LATER**

Mikasa pushed the front door open gently and took a few steps towards the front gate when her phone vibrated in her pocket. Pulling it out and checking the caller ID, she accepted the call and pressed the phone to her ear.

“Get out of the base and turn right.” Zara’s slightly muffled voice filtered through the speaker and Mikasa quickly hurried to obey. “Annie’s sprinting away and she’s going to hit the unhacked areas pretty soon, so I won’t be able to tell you with certainty where she is. Just head out of the base, turn right and keep going straight. I’ll try my best to keep an eye on her.”

With that, Zara quickly disconnected the call. Swiftly winding the scarf around her neck, Mikasa hurried to the gate and set off to look for Annie before anything bad happened.

Thanks to Zara, Mikasa didn’t have to walk very far until she found Annie.

Shaking her head slightly, she leaned gently against the pole and tilted her head up. “Come on down. It’s cold up there.”

Annie adjusted her grip on the electric wires but ignored her. Mikasa sighed and tried again.

“Or you could come down because a person sitting on some telephone wires is suspicious?”

Mikasa was met with more silence. “Look, I’m not going to forcefully take you back. We can go for a walk and talk, or not talk at all.”

At this, Annie glanced down at Mikasa but made no move to descend from the wires. “Why do you care?”

“Come down and I’ll tell you.” Annie still made no move. “You know I can easily rip this pole out of the ground and shake you down.”

"Yeah, and knock out the power to half this block." Annie countered.

Mikasa shrugged. "Oh well. I've done worse things."

This made Annie pause. “You’re not going to leave me alone, are you?”

“Nope.”

Annie showed no signs of responding or moving from the wires, so Mikasa simply shot a quick text to Zara and crossed her arms against the chill of the night air. Neither of them said a word for a long time until Annie sighed.

“I really don’t like my family.”

Mikasa stayed silent to allow the other woman to let out her thoughts.

“None of them ever gave a shit about me so I never gave a shit about them. Now suddenly I find myself giving a bit of a shit about Christa.”

“And is giving a little bit of a shit about Christa a bad thing?”

Annie huffed audibly and began to adjust her grip on the wires. “I’m coming down if it means we won’t have this conversation right now.”

Mikasa allowed a tiny smile of victory. “I’ll make sure you don’t fall.”

“If you drop me, Ackerman, I’ll break your nose.”

Holding her hands up in compliance, Mikasa and moved to stand under Annie. “Can you even break my nose?”

“You want to find out?” Annie shot back, and began to make her descent.

It only took a short minute until she was back on the ground and shrugging into her jacket. Mikasa looked at her expectantly but Annie simply walked past her and pulled her hood up over her head. Mikasa shrugged and moved to follow the blonde.

Luckily, it was dark enough that even under a streetlamp, any passerby would not be able to recognise any distinctive facial features from either of them, as their faces were hidden hidden by Annie’s hood or Mikasa’s loose hair. They walked aimlessly for over an hour, stopping once to buy coffee from a tiny late night cafe and eventually wandering into a small, hidden park.

Mikasa sat down on a bench, grateful to be off her feet. She had accidentally kicked the side of a train carriage too hard yesterday, sending it flying across the ground and bruised her shin. Annie sat down next to her and cupped her coffee between her hands to warm them.

“You don’t strike me as the type of person who drinks caramel hot chocolates with three sugars.” Annie eyed Mikasa’s large cup.

“And I don’t know how you can stand dark-roast coffee with three espresso shots. Just the smell is giving me a headache.”

Annie shrugged. “Trying to clear my head, and it’s doing its job.”

Mikasa nodded and rubbed her thumb over the fake name written on the side of her cup. “We really don’t have to talk if you don’t want to but if you do, I’m here to listen. I’m also not here to drag you back against your will. Okay?”

Her question was answered with a small grunt and Annie and took a swig of her steaming coffee. They sat in silence for a further twenty minutes, neither one initiating conversation.

“My father doesn’t care about me, I haven’t seen my mother since I was two and I haven’t seen any other family member in ten years.” Annie said out of the blue. “Normally, I wouldn’t give a shit if I found out about new family members but Christa is something else. She’s a clean slate and we’re going to have to live together, train together and work together. I’m going to have to trust her with my safety and my life.”

Mikasa took a sip of her drink before answering. “So what are you going to do?”

Shoulders sagging, Annie sighed. “I don’t know. I don’t even know why I’m telling you this.”

“Sometimes you just need to get stuff off your chest.” Mikasa offered. “I’m a neutral force in this problem.”

They fell into silence again. The only thing that was generating noise was the odd car driving past the park, or the rustling of trees and leaves from the wind.

“What about you?” Annie inquired a few minutes later.

Mikasa stiffened slightly. “My parents are dead.”

That made Annie pause for a moment, unsure of what to say. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

Mikasa shrugged and began to fiddle with the ends of her scarf. “They have been for a while now.”

“What happened, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“House fire. Apparently my dad was already dead by the time the firefighters got to our house and my mother died later in hospital.”

“Were you young?”

“Yeah, but that’s another story for another day.”

Annie nodded and backed off, understanding her reluctance to divulge anymore.

“Well, it’s not like I can exactly run from this problem.” She mused. “If Christa turns out like the rest of my family, it’s not really a disappointment, actually. It’s kind of normal. Don’t have much to lose if I give her a chance.”

“I’d be surprised if Christa does turn out to be someone like your father.” Mikasa commented.

“Yeah, well, anything is possible. Take this entire situation as an example.” Finishing off the rest of her coffee, she took the lid off and crushed it, before stomping on the actual cup to mask her fingerprints. Better safe than caught was her main reasoning for doing so. “We should probably go back. I did overreact.” She didn’t admit it out loud, but she did feel a little guilty for her earlier outburst.

“Christa’s probably still awake and waiting for you.”

Annie heaved a great sigh and stood up off the bench, readjusting her jacket. Mikasa took the opportunity to chug the rest of her lukewarm drink and lobbed the empty cup into a trashcan a few meters away. Standing up, she stretched her arms above her head and Annie turned to face her, opening and closing her mouth for a few seconds like she wanted to say something.

“What is it?”

Realising she had been caught, Annie turned back around and walked forward a few steps before stopping and turning around again. “I-- thanks for doing this.” She gestured between the two of them. “I really might have done something stupid if you weren’t here.”

Mikasa’s lips quirked slightly. “No worries.”

Annie nodded awkwardly, swiftly turning on her heel and began to walk away, dumping her crushed coffee cup in the trashcan nearby.

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 0222 HOURS, 14TH SEPTEMBER 2011**

It was well past two in the morning by the time Annie and Mikasa reached the base again. Unsurprisingly, the lights in the living room were still on and they could both just make out the sounds of Petra and Christa talking quietly to each other. Both of them fell quiet and Ymir rose to her feet as they walked in. Annie ignored Ymir’s glare and stopped in front of Christa. The smaller blonde stood up nervously and twisted her hands together.

Annie scanned her sister’s face in silence for a few moments. It had only just registered in her mind that their eyes were the same shade of greenish blue and that they had a similar chin and mouth shape. The same could not be said for their noses; Christa must have taken after her father for that. Christa’s hair was also a lighter shade of blonde.

“I’m sorry.” Annie said quietly and Christa’s eyes widened. “I overreacted and I shouldn’t have brought up your memory. And it’s nice to have a family member that I don’t outright hate.”

At this, Christa let out a wavering breath and threw her arms around Annie’s waist. The taller blonde stiffened for a few moments at the unexpected contact but relaxed slightly, slowly putting a hand on her sister’s shoulder as a way to return the hug. The tension that drained from the room was almost palpable but Ymir did not relax entirely. This did not escape Annie.

"Relax, I already apologised and I meant it."

“So your usual apologies don’t mean anything?” Ymir scoffed.

“You’re just fishing for an argument now.”

“Can we please not argue anymore tonight?” Christa interrupted before anyone could respond. Ymir glared at Annie, jaw twitching, but backed off.

Christa clung to Annie tightly for a few more seconds before releasing her and wiping at her eyes. Sensing that Christa had something to say, Petra gently tugged on Hanji’s arm.

“Come on, it’s getting really late and you haven’t slept for almost three days now.”

Hanji frowned and looked between Christa and Annie. “But they’re still--” They fell silent at a strange look that Petra gave them. “Uh, okay. Well, goodnight then.” Still looking highly confused, they allowed themselves to be pulled out of the room. Mikasa brushed past Annie on her way out and Ymir hesitated slightly before stalking out, closing the door behind her with slam.

Before Christa had a chance to speak, Annie gently grasped her sister by the shoulders.“I know we need to talk but it’s getting really late, and you’re probably still tired from your session this morning. We can talk later, okay?” Christa briefly looked like she was going to protest but nodded tiredly instead.

“Okay. I’m sure you probably want some more time to process this too.”

“I think it would be best if we both had some more time to process this.”

After yawning, Christa responded. “Good point.”

“Look, I know I don’t come off as the friendliest person but I really do want to give you a chance. Do whatever you want with that knowledge.”

“I’m glad, because I really want to know you too.”

With a small smile, Annie pulled away and grasped her sister’s hand briefly. “Alright then. I’ll see you tomorrow morning then.”

“Goodnight!” Christa called and Annie walked out of the room, closing the door behind her with a quiet click. Christa’s eyes widened, suddenly remembering that Ymir was still outside the room but thankfully, Annie and Ymir only exchanged a few words before she heard one of them walk away.

Walking to the door and opening it, she spied her girlfriend leaning against the wall with a scowl on her face.

“She came back, didn’t she?” Christa argued quietly. “That’s got to mean something good, right?”

“She could have also come back because she knows she ain’t got nowhere to go without getting her and her mountain of a nose locked up.” Ymir pointed out.

The shapeshifter sighed sadly. “I know. But whatever her reason is, I’ll probably know real soon. I really, _really_ want to give this a try, okay? Be at least civil to Annie? Please?”

Ymir pursed her lips but agreed. “I’ll play nice if she does.”

“We’ll most likely end up working together for a long time so best to start now, right?”

“Yeah. Whatever. If she starts shit I’m not going to ignore it.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to. Just as long as you try to be civil for now.”

**THE NEXT AFTERNOON**

Annie breathed deeply and tried to focus all her energy at her fingertips into the palms of her hand. Considering the state that she was in merely two weeks ago, this was a challenging feat but it was currently being made more difficult because her mind kept wandering to the events of the night before. Her mind strained to produce what she wanted but after a few seconds, the sparks on her fingertips sputtered and faded. Frustrated, Annie whirled around and landed a solid kick against the nearest punching bag.

“And here I thought only children kicked things when they don’t get what they want.”

Annie gritted her teeth at the sound of the voice. “Fuck off, Ymir. I’m really not in the mood for an argument right now.”

Ymir held her hands up. “Not looking for one.”

Annie turned and regarded the other woman with narrowed eyes. “Then what are you doing here? You made your feelings pretty clear yesterday.”

“Did I? I don’t seem to recall making any threats or anything.” Ymir slouched over to a nearby bench and sat down with a huff, folding her arms across her chest.

“You don’t have to. I can see it.”

“Fair enough.”

They looked at each other silently, neither breaking the stare until Anne huffed and went back to her attempt at power control. Breathing in deeply again, she attempted to localise the sparks in the palm of her hand but failed again as the static at her fingertips refused to move.

“ _Rabota, kusok der'ma_.” Annie swore under her breath.

“Having trouble?”

“Took you that long to figure out?” Annie snapped. In her current mood, Ymir’s voice was really starting to grate against her nerves.

“What does it feel like when you make electricity?”

Annie frowned at the unusual question. “It tickles.”

“You’re trying too hard.”

Annie recoiled slightly. “Excuse me?”

Ymir leaned forwards and rested her elbows against her knees, extending a hand out. “You’re thinking about what you want to do too much. Your face looks like you’re trying to force out a shit.” A single flame appeared on the tip of her middle finger. “That tickling, you gotta feel it and let it go.” The flame spread down her finger and across her palm. “It’s simple. What are you actually trying to do?”

“Hanji wants to see if I can hold a ball in the middle of my both my hands at the same time.”

“Well don’t think too much about it then. Remember that tickling feeling and imagine it kinda pooling in the palm of your hand.”

Annie glanced dubiously at Ymir and back at her hand, huffing out a breath before trying again. This time, she concentrated on the tingly feeling at the tips of her fingers and she studied it for a few moments. Remembering how Ymir’s flame travelled, Annie imagined the feeling spreading down her fingers to pool intensely in the palms of her hand.

Much to her shock, the crackling blue electricity at her fingertips spluttered once before spidering out and meeting at a single point in the very center of her palms.

“Good! Now just hold onto that feeling for as long as you can. Probably won’t be for more than a few seconds though. This shit is hard at first, but you’ll start to develop a lot faster once you get the hang of it.”

Annie focused and eventually, the sparks in her palms grew until they resembled spinning electric orbs. She managed to hold the energy in her hands for a little over twenty seconds and when the crackling energy faded completely, Annie staggered into the seat next to Ymir. She rested her elbows on her knees and took several deep breaths to calm her rapid heartbeat while ignoring Ymir’s unsubtle staring.

“Are you going to say anything or are you going to just sit there and stare at me?”

Ymir studied Annie’s expression for a few moments longer. “You know,” She began, “I’m not good at a lot of things. Like reading, and making eggs without burning them because I’m shit when guessing how long things take to do something.”

“Hooray for you.” Annie replied dryly. “What’s your point?”

“One thing I am really good at however, is reading people.”

Annie’s dry tone of voice was not lost. “Hooray again. You still haven’t gotten to the point.”

“I think that your family must have done some really fucked up stuff to turn you into a crystal queen. And that no one here knows if Christa’s family did some really fucked up stuff.”

“Seriously, what are you trying to get at here?”

Leaning back, Ymir assumed a passive posture. “I’m just covering for Christa. She may not remember any of it, but she’s had a lot of shit thrown her way. And you probably have to.” The taller woman’s voice softened significantly. “Give her a chance, yeah? Whatever you think, she’s just going to try and make this new sister thing work. She cares about you so much already and you two have had like, five whole conversations?”

“And why would she do that?”

“She cares entirely too much about everyone in this place already, and you’re her sister so she’s going to care about you a hundred times more than everyone else put together.”

“Well, I hope you’re right.” Annie murmured.

The sounds of animalistic heavy breathing drew them both from their conversation and they looked up to see a large, shaggy wolf making its way slowly down the winding stairs. “Christa, you’re awake.”

The wolf dipped its head slightly and padded over to the bench, turning back into a human when she reached it.

“Headache’s gone and I’ve had some food too.” The shapeshifter replied quietly and rubbed her eyes.

“You had a session with Hanji this morning?” Annie asked. Christa blinked tiredly and nodded.

“Right.” Ymir stood and kissed Christa’s forehead briefly before gently prodding her towards her vacated seat. “You two have a lot to work out so I’ll leave you to it.” With a final meaningful look at Annie, the freckled woman turned and jogged up the stairs two at a time.

Christa turned her head towards Annie and opened and closed her mouth a few times, completely at a loss of what to say.

“You sleep alright?” She eventually got out.

“Yeah.” Annie lied, not mentioning the fact that she hadn’t been able to catch a wink of sleep ever since the news. “You?”

The smaller sibling shrugged and the two of them sat on the bench awkwardly, not knowing how to start.

“Sisters, huh?” Christa eventually offered.

Annie huffed out a short, nervous laugh and sniffed. "I guess so. How are you feeling?"

"I don't know, it still doesn't seem real."

"Yeah, I know what you mean."

"So..." Christa began, "You had no idea you had a sister?"

She shook her head. "Not a clue. My dad never mentioned it and I'm not even sure he knew either."

"I'm 19 and you're 23, so he may not have known."

"I wouldn't put it past him to not tell me if he did know anyway." Annie said as an afterthought.

"Why would he do that?"

Rubbing her hands together as a sign of discomfort, Annie digressed. “Father didn’t care about me. He was always distant but after I started my sophomore year he sort of just stopped caring entirely. We lived in the same house and he paid some of the bills but that was it. We didn’t speak to each other unless we needed to.”

“I don’t remember my father at all.” Christa looked down at her clasped hands. “Do you... remember anything about our mother?” She asked in a small voice.

Annie shook her head. “Not much. Mother left when I was 2 and I haven’t seen or heard from her since.”

The shapeshifter cocked her head to the side. “You weren’t born here?”

“No, I was born in Russia. Yekaterinburg, to be precise.”

“How old were you when you came here?”

“Six. I had to redo a grade in school.”

“Do you miss it?”

“Russia? Only in small doses. It’s okay if I’m there for two or three weeks but anything longer than that bores me.”

“At least you enjoy it.”

Annie took the opportunity presented and diverted the topic away from herself: the concept of talking about her younger years to a stranger, despite Christa being her sister, still made her nervous. "So is Christa your actual name?"

The shapeshifter shook her head.

“How did you even start using that name?”

“I was resting as a dog next to this gas station and pondering the fact that I couldn’t remember my name. 'Christa' was the first name that I heard after realising this, so I kept it.”

Annie nodded in understanding. “How are your memory sessions going?”

Christa shrugged. “Good? I don’t know.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I’m only getting little bits a time and it’s going really slowly. I supposed it’s better than remembering nothing though.”

“Find out anything new today?”

Christa smiled widely. “Yep, I probably lived in Rochester at some point. Hanji recognised the Kodak building. Although I also have noticed that I’m starting to remember bits and pieces of German. I watched a bit of the German channel on TV today and I understood most of what was said.”

“German is a beautiful language, but it can also be kind of terrifying if it’s being screamed at you by an angry visitor.”

Christa giggled. “So is Russian, I can imagine.”

This drew a laugh from Annie. “Yeah, it definitely is. And if you can understand German, we might be able to make some sort of intuitive leap and assume that you’re German. If it helps, our mother was Russian, so you could be half Russian half German.”

“That’s… so weird.” The shapeshifter observed, wrinkling her nose. “It sounds less weird to think of myself as something like, half wolf half bird.”

“Speaking of which,” The elder sister said, “Can you change into any animal?”

Christa nodded eagerly. “I think so. Normally I just need to think of an animal and it happens.”

“What’s your favourite to turn into?”

Tilting her head to the side, Christa tapped her chin. “The wolf is my favourite, but there’s this eagle that I really enjoy as well.”

“Hanji did something with my head earlier and just for a second, I could sort of hover with my electricity and even just doing that was amusing, so I imagine flying would be so much more fun.”

“It really is!” She gushed, her entire body perking up. “Especially when I turn into this type of falcon and go up really high into the air and woosh. Come straight down.”

“Didn’t you spend almost two hours doing just that yesterday?” Annie asked with a small smile on her lips.

Christa flushed. “Yeah, I… got a little carried away. Swimming really fast as a dolphin is really fun as well.”

“You’re lucky. It sounds like an experience and a half.”

“You don’t have to answer this but… when was the first time you used your powers?”

Annie gave a quiet and brief chuckle. “I was expecting that question.”

“You don’t have to answer it, I’m just curious.” Christa reiterated quickly. “Sorry.”

“No, no, it’s alright.” Annie reassured as she rolled up the sleeves of her hoodie. “See these?”

The smaller blonde nodded quickly and absent mindedly reached out to trace the patterns on her sister’s arms.

“I got them when I was five after I got hit by lightning. They were never this obvious though, it just got a lot darker over the past few weeks.”

Christa looked highly alarmed at this new information. “What?”

“Yep, I don’t even remember why I was outside during a storm but that happened and ever since then, I would always let off this static or electrical appliances would flicker or go out whenever I got emotional. It started getting really hard to control my temper after I graduated school and eventually it got so bad that I overloaded four blocks because a co-worker forgot to put the lid back on a tin of coffee after he used it.”

“And now you’re sitting in what used to be a military base with your new sister and six other superpowered people...”

“And now I’m here.” Annie repeated softly. A large purple bruise on Christa’s forearm caught her eye and she looked at it, an idea forming in her head.

“I saw you learning how to fight with Rico yesterday.”

Christa slumped and rubbed her arm, which was still sore after catching Rico’s shin against it. “I’m not picking it up very well, even with Hanji’s knowledge transfer thing. Doesn’t really help that she still kinda scares me a little.”

“If you want, I can teach you instead.”

“Really?” Christa perked up again and Annie was sure that if she had a tail right now, it would be furiously wagging back and forth.

“Sure. Plus, it might even act as a little bonding time." Her voice grew softer. "I meant it when I said I was glad to have a family member that I don’t despise.”

“I would love that!” Annie couldn’t help the quirking of the corner of her lips at Christa’s enthusiasm.  

“I saw you fight Mikasa earlier too, and if she wasn’t so strong you would have beaten her.”

“I could’ve.” Annie agreed. “We’re still very evenly matched even though I’ve had many more years of training than she has. She has much more power and stability, but I’m a lot faster and agile than she is.”

“When did you start fighting?”

“During middle school. It was just something to do at first.”

“You got very good at it.”

“I depended on it as a way to get money when I got older. I had to be very good at it.”

“What do you mean?”

“My dad stopped supporting me.” The older blonde shrugged and began to pick at her thumbnail. “McDonald’s and supermarkets only pay you so much and I was good at fighting, so I started entering competitions and winning.”

“Did your dad care then?”

“No, he just made me pay half of the bills he used to be paying all of.”

“Your dad’s an asshole.” Christa commented.

“I’m glad he’s out of my life now. Glad they’re all out of my life now.” Annie scratched the back of her neck and averted her gaze. “I’m glad you’re here though.” She added quietly.

Christa’s eyes softened and she smiled widely. “I’m glad you’re here too. We can make our own family here, with the people here and the people that will join.”

“I swear, I've known that we’re related for about twelve hours and I'm already starting to go soft for you."

“It’s not a bad thing to have a soft spot for someone.” Christa commented.

“We’ll see,” was all Annie said, “we’ll see.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 1402 HOURS, 15TH SEPTEMBER 2011**

“Aim a little higher, Ymir. You’re trying to hit the person in the head, not crush their throat.” Regardless of abilities and skill level, Rico had insisted that everyone was at least competent with using a specific set of weapons. Some had taken to the training well but others, like Ymir, were struggling slightly.

“I’m fuckin’ trying, alright?” The pyrokinetic growled out in frustration and swept the stick out in front of her in a wide arc. Without warning, the wooden staff in her hand caught alight and a wave of fire erupted from the end of it, forcing Rico to quickly leap out of the way.

“Jesus tits!” Ymir yelled, dropping the stick in shock and it fell to the floor. Hanji, seeing what had happened, sprang to their feet and grabbed the nearest fire extinguisher and sprayed its contents over the burning staff. Acrid black smoke drifted up into the air and the three of them stared at each other in shock.

"That… was not intentional."

“Didn’t think it was.” Rico said. The group remained silent for another minute, still in shock. “You did see how that fire travelled, right?”

Ymir looked confused for a second but her eyes widened in realisation. “It didn’t go ass over elbow and actually went in a straight line.”

“And you can hold a steady stream of fire comfortably now, and your fireballs are looking very controlled too. You’ve improved a lot.”

“Well, I really don’t want to get shanked or ganked so improving was something that had to happen.”

“Either way, you’ve worked really hard these few weeks and it’s paid off. Well done.”

Ymir smiled slightly in acknowledgement. “Even if I can control it without help, can I still have a staff or something anyway?”

Rico nodded. “If that’s what you want.”

Her brows rose in surprise. “Really? I was expecting an instant no and a lecture on the reasons why I can’t have one.”

“Back-up weapons are very important. Just because you have powers, doesn’t mean you can always rely on them.”

“Are you going to insist on everyone having a backup weapon?” Hanji asked.

“Of course. No one is doing anything before they know how to use it well either.”

“Don’t you think some of us can survive without one?” Ymir gestured vaguely in the direction of Mikasa’s hangar. “She can lift trains, remember?”

Rico gestured at their eye. “So? I can use every kind of weapon, have enhanced reactions and senses and heal very quickly but that didn’t stop me from taking a scalpel to the eye, did it? Powers won’t always help if you get flanked or blindsided. Everyone who joins and plans to go on active duties will pick the most suitable back-up weapon from the armoury and will learn how to use it at a satisfactory level before they are even allowed out on their own. Hell, I’m going to make Zara do it too just in case something happens.”

Ymir held her hands up in defence. “Alright, point taken.”

“Good. You could use one of my swords if it would help because all the staves I have right now are all wooden.”

“Wouldn’t it just like, do the ice cream thing or some shit like that?”

It took Rico a few seconds before she understood. “Melt? Something like that, but I know a superpowered blacksmith who might be able to help.”

“A superpowered blacksmith.” Ymir deadpanned.

“Yes, they can manipulate the composition and structure of pretty much any kind of material. I could ask them and I’m sure they’ll take that challenge.”

“Won’t they want to know what you’re using a fireproof sword for?” Hanji asked.

“They never ask. They trust me enough to know that I won’t use it for anything bad and I trust them enough to not breathe a word to anyone.”

“How much will it cost?”

“Usually modifications for me don’t cost anything but if I want something made, then I’ve got to pay them but even then it’s not too expensive because I did them several _huge_ favours. We’ll see if any of the ones I have now feel comfortable and we’ll get them to make a new one if none of them do.”

"How good are they?"

"I broke into a fort once and if I wasn't wearing the thin vest that they modified for me, I'd probably be dead."

"Even with your healing?" Hanji’s eyes widened behind the goggles.

Rico nodded. "Yep. I took seven bullets to the chest before I realised that the people shooting were actually hitting me. I took a lot more bullets that mission and none of them went through. All I had was some bruising but I had to throw the shirt away afterwards."

“Would this person also be willing to change the structure of some material? Ymir’s suit isn’t coming along as well as we expected and I’m running out of ideas.”

“I'm sure they’d appreciate the challenge. I’ll ask for you.”

"They sound incredibly useful."

"Are we about to get a new member to this little merry band?" Ymir inquired.

"Doubt it, but I don’t think they’ll have an issue with me bringing them stuff to modify often. But for now,” Rico picked up one of the shorter staves and threw it for Ymir to catch, “I'm going to start teaching you the basics of using a sword."

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 1356 HOURS, 16TH SEPTEMBER 2011**

Mikasa’s foot connected with Rico’s side with a solid crack, and the shorter fighter doubled over in pain. They coughed multiple times, blood spurting out of their mouth and Rico held up a finger and groped for the bucket nearby.

“You’re lucky that I’m the one getting beaten up by you because if this was anyone else, they’d be in a little bit of trouble.” Rico coughed up the blood into the bucket and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. Leaning back onto the floor, Rico winced as her multiple broken ribs shifted and reattached themselves.

“Sorry, I got a little too into it.” Mikasa sheepishly rubbed the back of her neck and sat down next to Rico’s slightly shaking figure.

“You have to control it. That’s the whole point of these sessions.”

“I’m trying, okay?” Mikasa retorted. “I’m trying really hard.”

“I know you are. I used to do it too.”

Mikasa was taken aback. “What do you mean?”

“This proficiency with weapons? My first instinct was to go for the kill and training myself to think of incapacitation first was incredibly difficult.”

“How long did it take you to control it?”

“Months.” Rico admitted. “And three dead innocent people.”

“Three dead innocents?” Mikasa asked incredulously.

“Three security guards.”

“Oh right, you killed people for money. Collateral damage?”

“I killed people that I knew for certain had escaped the law.” Rico said sharply. “There’s a difference.”

“I did pretty much the same thing and you didn’t seem to have trouble ignoring that fact.” The ex-gang member shot back.

Rico grimaced, placing both hands over their ribs. “I know, you’re right. I killed people for money. You killed a person who was about to commit murder. I... also shouldn't have reacted the way I did when I saw your Brawler tattoo.”

Mikasa didn’t know how to react for a couple of seconds at the sudden change of direction in the conversation. “You’re apologising?”

“Yes.”

“That’s… I wasn’t expecting that.”

Rico rolled her eye. “I know what I did was wrong, so I’m apologising for it. Is that so hard to believe?”

“Yes, and no.” Mikasa admitted. “How long have you been sitting on this?”

“A while now.”

“And why did you do it now?”

“You brought it up.”

Neither of them said anything for a while as Rico’s ribs stitched themselves back together. “Well in hindsight,” Mikasa mused out loud after a while, “I’m kind of glad that you did. I probably wouldn’t be here if you didn’t knee me in the face.” Rico wheezed out a laugh and Mikasa cracked a grin.

“Alright, enough talking for now. My ribs are healed and no longer sore so we can go back to you kicking my ass.”

“In a controlled manner.” Mikasa added, extending her hand and hauling Rico back onto her feet.

“You’re getting there, don’t worry.” Rico assumed an offensive stance. “You’re on defense this time. Aim for my joints.” Without warning, Rico launched themselves forward, and all that could be heard in the underground training room was the sound of bodies colliding and the soft huffs of breath being expelled.

**FOUR HOURS LATER**

As expected, training had run late again and it was getting quite late when everyone was ready have dinner together. Rico had dutifully gone out in search of food and had been absent for a while now. Just as Hanji began to toy with the idea of calling Rico just to see where they were, they strolled into the kitchen and shrugged off their jacket.

“As requested, I have four pounds of cooked prawns, eight steaks and an extra three packets of bacon because they were on special. Hanji, I’m not sure which kind of pepper you were looking for so I just grabbed one off the shelf. Christa, I will never understand your fascination with Mountain Dew but I got you a large bottle anyway because you’re not drinking alcohol with us.” Christa made a noise of happiness and briefly hugged Rico before taking the bottle.

Rico turned to Mikasa, who had just entered the kitchen area. “Mikasa, I also went to the store that you asked me to but I’m not sure if it’s the right sauce because everything was in Japanese and I needed help.”

Rico passed Mikasa a bottle of liquid seasoning and Mikasa made a pleased face. “It’s the correct one. Thank you.”

“I also bought you another packet of those lemonade candy things because I may or may not have eaten the entire bag that you had before. Sorry about that.”

Mikasa laughed as Rico passed her a bag of bright blue candy. “It’s alright, I don’t blame you. They really are addictive.”

In the kitchen, Hanji set the pan to warm up and leaned against the counter next to the stove where Petra had begun to take care of the prawns. “It seems like those two are getting along a little bit better now.” Hanji said quietly to Petra.

Petra nodded. “They’ve been training a lot together, so I think they at least respect each other now. I’m glad.” She said in a whisper. She pushed herself off the counter when she realised that Ymir was trying to gain access to the drawer that held all the plates.

“If you had told me two months ago that I’d be eating steak and prawns while drinking beer with a bunch of people with superpowers, I would have laughed and asked what you were high on.” Ymir commented in a slight joking tone.

“Me too.” Christa chimed in.

At Christa’s words, Annie jolted up from the bench and jogged over to Rico. “Oh right, hey Rico?”

“What is it?” They questioned, putting the plastic bag in their hands away and leaning against the counter.

“I know you’re training Christa in fighting but I was wondering if you could let me do it instead.”

Rico frowned slightly. “Let you train Christa?”

Annie nodded. “I’m not entirely sure how to approach this new,” Annie struggled for a word, “ _relationship_ so I just want to start off with something I’m very familiar with.”

“So you’re going to teach your new sister how to beat people up as a way to bond with her.” Rico deadpanned. Annie looked unamused and simply nodded.

Rico contemplated their answer for a few seconds and nodded. “I don’t see why not. You’re more than capable so I’m fine with it. I’m still going to test her every now and then to see how she’s going.”

“Thank you.” With a nod of her head, Annie turned to head in Christa’s direction to tell her and she spied Mikasa looking at her. Mikasa shot her a discrete thumbs up and Annie squeezed her shoulder lightly when she passed her.

“I think I’m throwing this skillet away after I cook the beef.” Hanji said as they removed a piece of cooked steak out of the pan and put in a raw one. “It looks awful. And whoever wanted the rare piece of steak please come and get it!”

Petra looked up from deshelling the prawns. “Sure, just add the pan to the list of things we also need to get.”

“Did you also include a new microwave?” Zara added, sliding past Petra to get to her steak. “To replace the one we had for only a month?”

"Well, if it wasn't for Swedish Chef of the Muppets, we wouldn't need a new microwave." Annie sniped.

"Hurdy gurdy go _fuck_ yourself, big nose." Ymir snarked back.

Annie snorted at the nickname. “Try harder, inverted tits, already heard that one before.”

“No arguing during meals, remember?” Petra intervened, looking pointedly between Annie and Ymir. They both grumbled something that sounded suspiciously like ‘yes mum’ and resumed setting the table. Hanji finished cooking the beef and everyone sat down and began to eagerly tear their way through the food.

“Mikasa?” Hanji called towards the end of the meal. The woman in question looked up from her food with a questioning expression.

“I’m almost finished making a piece of equipment that I’ve been working on for a while now and out of all of us, I think that you would benefit most from it.”

Mikasa finished chewing her mouthful of steak and swallowed before replying. “What is it?”

“It’s a grappler. It’ll be attached to your forearm and if it works, you’ll be able to grapple onto things and swing around instead of just running and jumping everywhere.”

“Sounds fun,” Mikasa replied honestly, “what do you need me to do?”

“I just need to take a few measurements. Height, weight, dimensions of various body segments, things like that. It won’t take more than fifteen minutes.”

Mikasa put down her knife and fork. “When do you want to do that?”

“Tomorrow morning before breakfast? I’ll probably be awake after eight so just come to my lab before you eat breakfast and we can take the measurements then.”

“I can do that.”

“Good!” Hanji twisted around to face Rico, who had gotten up from the bench to get a drink. “Rico, you might get one too if you don’t dislocate your shoulder or elbow every time you use it.”

“Sounds good.” They took a large gulp of their drink and abruptly remembered something. “Also, reminder to everyone, I’m going to pick up the indoor parkour equipment tomorrow at around 11. When it gets back, you’re all going to have to help me get it out of the truck and into the main training hangar.”

“How much is there?” Ymir asked around a mouthful of bread.

“Enough that it might take two or three trips even with the extra truck we hired.”

“Getting it in the hangar and arranging it is probably going to take up most of the day, so you should all get some rest. Especially this one.” Hanji gestured at Christa, who had finished her dinner and promptly nodded off against Ymir’s arm.

“She had a very long session this morning and trained for hours, so I don’t blame her.” Annie said.

“Probably should get her to bed then.” Petra suggested. “Go, we’ll clean up.”

Ymir nodded and stood to very carefully pick up a sleeping Christa. “Aye aye, sarge. Goodnight everyone.”

“And I think that goes for everyone,” Rico stated as Ymir with a dozing Christa left the room, “we’ve got a busy day tomorrow, and a busier rest of the week. Rest up.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we tried.png (we really struggled with this chapter and we just decided 'fuck it' and posted it. any critiques would be really helpful!)


	7. Compressional Waves

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 1252 HOURS, 17TH SEPTEMBER 2011**

"Jesus Rico, how much did this all cost?"

Eying the mountain of unassembled poles, blocks and various other pieces of equipment, Ymir turned to look at the weaponmaster.

"A lot."

Ymir rolled her eyes at the unhelpful response. “Real specific there.”

Rico shrugged. “Well, we need all this so it doesn’t really matter.”

"Training for this is going to take ages." Christa commented as she nudged one of the large wooden blocks with her foot.

"You'll all get a knowledge transfer from Hanji and I, so you'll know how to do them. You’ll build up your fitness as you practice this too. Plus, it's not like you won’t have powers to help out and youtube exists. You don’t need to be an expert, just able to know at least the basics so you can move quicker and more efficiently. Comes in handy when you’re running away or when you’re chasing someone.” The phone in Rico’s hand buzzed twice, and they tapped the screen a few times to view the message. “Mikasa said she’s on her way back and will pick up the other two on her own so we can start constructing these.”

“Where are we going to start?” Annie asked, rolling up the sleeves of her white hoodie and retying her hair.

“Well, you and Ymir can start on assembling some of these poles.” Rico rummaged through the pile of instruction manuals and tossed the relevant one at Ymir. She caught the manual and flicked through it.

“Uh, I can do diagrams and pictures and shit but these words and instructions are a big fat no. You’re gonna have to tell me what to do, Annie.”

Annie straightened up and frowned. “What do you mean?”

The freckled woman flicked through the booklet again quickly. “All these words are swirly. Can’t read them.”

“Swirly?”

“I can’t read this, alright?” Ymir said with frustration. “Always had this problem. Even got a fancy ass name for it.”

Rico and Annie looked at each other in slight confusion. “What is it?”

“I don’t remember. Dys-something.”

“Dyslexia?”

“Yeah, that thing.”

"That... explains some things." Annie took the booklet from Ymir’s hands. “Would it help if I read it aloud while we put it together?”

“Yeah, just don’t throw too many instructions at me at once.”

“Got it. Tell me to slow down if you need to.”

Thankfully, Ymir and Annie managed to put together as many of the structures as they currently could with minimal bickering. However, that still left the problem of the large and weighted wooden blocks that needed standing up.

“Uh, Mikasa’s still on her way back so we might need to wait until we can get this thing upright.” Rico stated.

Christa pretty much bounced in the sitting position she was in. “I can do that!”

Petra frowned. “Christa, the thing is three times as tall as you. How are you going to-- oh.”

Midway through Petra’s sentence, Christa stood up, dusted her hands together and promptly changed into a very large grizzly bear.

“Well… that might work. Give it a go.”

Christa gave a loud snort and within a few short seconds, she had flipped the large block upright and sat down against it with a very pleased expression on her furry face.

“If that’s the case, think you can flip the other ones over as well?”

Nodding and standing on her hind legs, Christa paused for a moment to loom over Ymir and playfully pat her on the head. Ymir rolled her eyes and slapped the bear’s broad chest.

“Yeah yeah, enjoy it while it lasts, shorty.”

At that, Christa gave an amused snort and playfully pushed Ymir backwards, making the woman land backwards onto one of the large mats with a huff.

“Don’t you dare hug me. You might actually break me.”

Christa rolled her eyes and went over to the remaining three blocks, flipping them upright in less than a minute.

“Nice work.” Petra smiled, moving over to the bear as she sat back down to scratch behind her ears. Christa made a noise of contentment and would have bowled Petra over for more scratches but was interrupted by the sound of the gates screeching open and a large truck rolling into the base. “Do you mind if I disappear? Hanji said they wanted me in their lab.”

“Of course not,” Rico responded, “Mikasa’s back now anyway.”

With a final few scratches to Christa’s ears, Petra bid her goodbyes for the meanwhile and headed towards Rico’s armory first: Hanji mentioned something about her rifle, along with the bullets she used, but didn’t say much more outside of ‘visit me when you’re done setting up the equipment’. She honestly didn’t blame them for being vague, as Hanji was multitasking several things at once.

The trip was short: up an elevator, exiting the main building and walking to a building further away from the cluster of buildings they actually used. For safety reasons, Hanji’s lab had to be above ground with a ventilation system, and had to be decent distance away from the main buildings in case any accidents happened.

Passing the automated security checks, Petra stepped into Hanji’s lab. Unsurprisingly, it was just as messy and chaotic as their last lab, except this time it had an extra layer of illegality.

“Hanji?” Petra called out.

“I’m here!” Hanji peeped out of the door that was leading to the back room. “Did you bring your rifle?”

“Yes. Why do I need it?”

“Come on back here and I’ll tell you!” Hanji disappeared back into the back room.

Carefully dodging the stacks of paper, Petra passed through the door she last saw Hanji and was greeted by something she’d never expect to see: Hanji had built a firing range in the back of their lab. An actual usable firing range was in the back of Hanji’s lab.

“Hanji…”

“Yes?”

“Why do you have a firing range at the back of your lab?”

“One: because I can. Two: because you can’t go around with your frankly huge rifle and start opening fire on people with real bullets that kill, so I started working on some prototype bullets that can potentially diffuse a situation, or disable an attacker, without actually killing anyone.”

“That’s… actually a brilliant idea. Have you been modifying my .50 BMG ammunition?”

“I have indeed! I’ve worked with these before but still can’t get over how big those rounds are though. They’re longer than the length of a dollar bill. In regards to the modification, I didn't realise exactly how much of a punch they packed until I started messing around with them.”

“You were messing around with the _ammunition_?” Petra was horrified. “You know I can make a man’s head explode with them, right?”

“As I found out! The poor pig carcass I used didn't stand a chance. Regardless!” Hanji clapped their hands together. “I have some bullet modifications that will be able to provide support! I have smoke rounds, which will detonate on contact in a safe manner and deploy a thick smoke screen, confusing the target and allowing people to attack or get away. We have concussive rounds, which will be basically a bigger bullet that’s less aerodynamic and has a lower velocity and a lot less gunpowder with a high recoil as I found out so you can knock the person you’re aiming at unconscious. And finally we have shock rounds, which is basically an arc grenade in a bullet. On impact, the bullet emit two pulses of electricity that will hopefully act like a taser as well as disrupt electronics. Or, in reverse, it could even possibly amplify Annie’s powers! All these modifications have very useful qualities in our current line of work.”

“You put a lot of thought into this, didn't you?”

“I've been thinking about it for a long time, so yes. But these are in the very early stages of testing so there will be some failures.”

“Do I need to modify my rifle at all?”

Hanji shrugged. “No idea. We may have to if these modifications don’t work out as planned.”

“Well, I have the Accuracy International AS50 now since I had to give my M82 back to the military. They finally noticed that I still had it so I had to return it.” She began to unpack her rifle. “The AS50 is lighter and is more accurate compared to the M82.”

“You privately own a rifle?”

“Yeah.” Petra smiled. “It was ridiculously expensive, but I saved up for it all by myself and believe me, it’s worth it.”

“We’ll use the AS50 then!”

“Good. It’s also more than a kilogram lighter than the M82. Running around with it on my back won’t tire me out as much. Let me set up and I’m all yours.”

It didn't take long for Petra to set up: she went through the motions of reassembling her rifle like she was still in the military. As soon as the rifle was ready but unloaded, she made sure that they both had eye and ear protective gear, and the bullet resistant glass that Hanji would stand behind was all set up. Hanji had to set up their laptop as well, which would record the rifle and the bullet fired through various sensory equipment set around the lab.

“We’ll test the smoke rounds first. This test is just to make sure that the casing will act as it’s supposed to when it makes contact with a solid surface. There isn't enough of the mixture to actually produce the large cloud of smoke that it will later, so don’t worry!”

Not that it instilled any comfort in Petra.

“Are you ready?”

Petra nodded and propped the stock of the rifle against her shoulder. She only needed a short glance into her scope to line up the shot perfectly and gave Hanji thumbs up.

“Alright. Smoke rounds, test one. Fire when you’re ready.”

Petra breathed in slowly and exhaled, squeezing the trigger.

She barely had enough time to react when the round exploded upon impact and a cloud of smoke erupted from the bullet, which wafted over to the sniper in a matter of seconds. Petra’s hands immediately balled up a portion of her coat and pressed it against her mouth and nose. Her eyes stung mercilessly and she groped around blindly for the exit for a few moments before two strong hands grasped her by the waist and hauled her out. Through watery and stinging eyes, Petra could make out Hanji’s shape slamming the door shut before she had to close her eyes and press her hands against them tightly. She heard the sound of a container being opened and some liquid splashing onto the floor before a towel soaked in milk was slapped against her eyes.

Petra reopened her eyes, holding the towel against her stinging eyes with one hand and ripping her ear protectors off with the other. “Hanji, that smoke’s not supposed to feel like tear gas! I thought you said that there was barely enough of the mixture for it to even have a small reaction and that this test was only to see if the casing was alright! What on earth did you pu--“

Her question was cut off by loud beeping and a hissing noise as the sprinklers started working. Petra immediately clapped her hands over her ears to block out the painful high pitched noise and Hanji merely stared at her for a few moments before they sighed and went to find the controls for the sprinkler system, deliberately ignoring the sounds of Annie’s loud Russian swearing and Ymir’s indignant squawking ringing through their head.

“Zara _really_ has to set up an individual sprinkler system instead of just leaving it connected to the entire thing.”

**THREE HOURS LATER**

“Okay, ready to start the test?”

Petra nodded warily, checking the position of her ear protectors again before peering into her scope. Considering what happened last time, Petra had taken the opportunity to pick a better and more expensive pair just in case something exploded again.

“Alright! Concussive rounds, test one. Fire whenever you’re ready.”

Wincing slightly, Petra breathed in slowly and exhaled, pulling the trigger.

A colossal bang reverberated throughout the room as the bullet struck the metal dummy and passed right through it. The sniper removed her eye protection slowly while staring at the slightly smoking dummy before turning around to stare at Hanji with a horrified expression.

Hanji’s expression was half amused and half amazed. “Oops?”  

“Remind me, why do I need concussive rounds for a sniper rifle again?”

“Because we’re trying to knock people out without killing them and therefore diffusing a situation. I’ll have to tweak my designs on this one later.” A pause. “That was absolutely incredible though. Ready to move on?”

Petra internally winced but agreed with a nod of her head.

“Fantastic!” Hanji clapped their hands together. “Why don’t you change the dummy and I’ll get the protective shield for you?”

Once again nodding in agreement, the ex-Marine moved to the end of the range and dragged the used dummy off the stand before hauling a new one into its place.

“Well, I hope you don’t get fried.” Hanji called as they moved the protective shield into place.

Clapping the dummy on the shoulder once, Petra made her way back to the other side of the range and to the other side of the protective shield. She loaded her rifle with the new cartridge Hanji had placed next to it and gave a thumbs up to the scientist.

“Shock rounds, test one. Whenever you’re ready to go, Petra.”

Petra winced slightly and eyed the protective shield she was standing behind. Pressing the stock to her shoulder, she clicked off the safety, took aim, and fired.

The bullet ricocheted off the dummy and embedded itself in the roof. Both Hanji and Petra turned to look at each other and Hanji opened their mouth to say something but was interrupted by the power abruptly cutting.

There were a few moments of silence before Annie’s voice rang through Hanji’s brain once again: being telepathic wasn’t particularly private sometimes. “I swear it wasn’t me this time!” Ymir’s muffled remark soon followed and Annie gave a loud snort.

“Fuck off Ymir, at least I didn't melt a toilet!”

In the darkness, Petra put her head in her hands and sighed. “Ah, now I remember what I forgot to do today!” Hanji exclaimed. Petra merely sighed again.

“What did you forget to do?”

“Fix the backup generators. And get a new toilet.”

**A FURTHER TWO HOURS LATER**

“So are we supposed to expect any more things to happen while you and Petra test your ammunition?”

Hanji looked away sheepishly from Zara’s gentle glare. The power been restored to the entire base only an hour ago and Zara had been combing through her computers and tech for the second time that day to make sure nothing had been fried. Hanji was glad that nothing had been damaged, or they seriously doubted they would be alive right now.

“No, I’ll take some extra precautions to make sure nothing like what happened this afternoon happens again.”

“How did you even get the bullet embedded into the wiring?”

The scientist shrugged. “I genuinely don’t know. But I’ll find out one way or another.”

“Good. Just warn us before you do any testing again, okay?”

“Yeah, so we don’t lose an hour’s worth of progress and end up having to fight an annoying boss again.” Ymir grumbled quietly. 

“It was only annoying because your aim is shit.”

“Well at least I didn’t short out a controller because I suck at a game.”

“Well it’s not my fault that you absolutely suck at teamwork when fighting the Flood.”

“And that’s our cue to leave.” Petra tugged on Hanji’s sleeve. “Come on, let’s go take a nap.”

**ONE HOUR OF _NOT_ TAKING A NAP LATER**

Hanji swept Petra’s hair to the side slightly so that they could reach the recently discovered spot on Petra’s neck that made her breath come out in a quiet whimper. They kissed it gently and felt Petra’s body tremble slightly at the touch, but did not progress further. They were both drowsy from their previous exertions and more than content to bask in the hazy atmosphere of the room.

"We've had sex once and you've already found most of my spots."

Hanji shrugged lazily. "Scientist, so I have to be observant. You have many scars.” The scientist noted bluntly, reaching out to trace their pointer finger over a large patch of small marks and pitting that peppered from the top of her shoulders to her hip.

“Shrapnel.” Petra remembered quietly. “It was during my last tour of Iraq.”

“What happened?”

“We were out on patrol, going through a predetermined route as decided by command. It was a dangerous zone, but we still had to make ourselves known. Kat was scanning for mines and it’s a slow process because we have to be careful, and the next thing we heard was a couple of soft thuds. We looked down and there was 4 or 5 or more cooked grenades surrounding us. We didn’t even get to react when they went off. Four soldiers died instantly. Kat’s legs were shredded and mangled by the shrapnel. Then the firing started from the windows and we just returned fire, backing away and I was dragging Kat along with one hand and she was screaming...” The ex-marine swallowed thickly and rubbed at her eyes.

“Oh." Hanji replied, uncertain how to continue.

“I don’t know how long I kept firing for. If I didn’t fire, another marine went down.” Petra’s voice wavered slightly. “All I know is that when Garnett pulled me away from the position I was holding, I realised I had run out of ammunition and there was no more gunfire. We radioed for help again and I made sure I patched up everyone that I could until help got to us.”

“Kat survived?”

“We’re good friends, we still keep in contact. Somebody’s got to look after her because nobody else won’t.”

“She can’t look after herself?”

“She can -- it’s a long story, and something I’d prefer Kat to tell herself. Sorry, Hanji.”

“I don’t understand, but alright.”

Petra sat partially up in the bed, allowing Hanji to roll onto their front into her lap, resting their chin on Petra’s stomach.

"I could barely hear properly for a few days after and I still can't hear sounds if they’re too high pitched. It’s minor but it’s still there.” She took a moment to take a few breaths. "I also have one on my scalp from where shrapnel got through my helmet." Petra gently took one of Hanji’s hands and ran their fingers over a the left side of her scalp. Hanji felt a long, knotted scar and stroked it gently.

“Does it... do you have nightmares?”

Petra was silent for a few seconds as she fiddled with Hanji’s fingers. “I used to. Really bad ones too and I needed heavy medication just so I could sleep for a long time. It’s a lot better now. Unexpected loud noises also set me off really easily though.”

“Is that why you never stay in my lab for any longer than you have to?”

“Yes.”

“It must have been a bad explosion.”

“Do you… want to see?”

“Yes.”

Petra brought forth the memory, allowing Hanji to enter her mind. Petra remembered the heavy gear, the weight of her assault rifle and the arid landscape. She remembered the burning heat, the blinding sun and the abandoned town they were patrolling. Petra was surrounded by the soldiers she commanded, with Kat taking point with her handheld mine detector. Thuds that didn’t sound like footfalls on sand were heard, and past Petra looked down to see cooked grenades at their feet. Hanji felt past Petra’s muscle tense before a deafening explosion was heard: searing pain followed, and Petra cut off the memory there.

As the vision slowly faded, Hanji became aware of how tightly they were clenching their unoccupied hand. Hastily unclenching, they shook their hand to dissipate the sting of fingers digging into their palm and turned their attention back to the ex-marine.

"You had a head injury, shrapnel wounds and burns. That's how you got your Purple Heart."

"It was." Petra's voice was strained. "Twelve people in my squad, including me. Six survived the initial assault, two died from injuries, Kat got discharged, I stayed and so did one other. Shepard and Wendell, they’re the ones who died from their injuries. Kat’s got no legs now. Williams is back in active duty last I checked.”

“Do you keep in contact with them?”

“Williams sends me messages now and then and I send some money to Kat every month. Like I said earlier, we’re still in contact. I still feel guilty. I could’ve done better.”

"Your team medic was dead, your unit was scrambling, you were taking fire, you had numerous injuries and yet you managed to keep your soldiers alive until help arrived. There's not much more you could have done."

“Thank you, Hanji. The sentiment is nice, at least.” Petra smiled, rubbing Hanji’s cheek.

Through their lingering connection, Hanji caught a brief glimpse of sweat-shiny bare skin and fingers digging into their shoulder blades as a quiet moan reverberated through their ears. Oh.

“You had a sexual relationship with one of them?”

“How did you--” Petra looked confused for a few seconds before she understood. “You saw that, huh?”

“I didn’t do it on purpose! Our minds are still connected faintly.” Hanji felt legitimately bad. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright, not your fault.” Petra reassured, placing a hand over her partner’s. “And yes, I did. Kat and I were off duty. We had our needs and it was just sex, no emotional connection whatsoever. Before the incident in Iraq, we had leave. Kat offered her place to stay for the meanwhile because I was between houses - I was _really_ dedicated to my job - and we thought it’d be a fun idea to go out drinking and celebrate before we got back to hers. And hopefully pull because it’s _really_ dry overseas.” Petra let out a dry chuckle.

“We’re in the pub, still in our marine uniforms, relaxing together and our original plans didn't work because, well, Kat’s gay and either men hit on her or stayed away from her because she’s naturally intimidating and I’m pansexual and even _I_ couldn’t pull because it was rubbish men. I remember one saying to me, ‘I didn’t know you were in the military, I thought you were just dressing up.’ and I replied with, deadpan, ‘I’m a military sharpshooter. A marine. As in I could shoot your balls off at a thousand yards.’ He slunk away immediately. Never saw his face again round town, actually. Anyway, since we weren't getting anywhere, we just went home. We came to the conclusion that we’re just friends in here, not soldiers or people of command, and so we sorted our needs out.”

“More than once?”

“More than once.” Petra confirmed. “We still kept it quiet from command though. People still don’t get the concept of the fact that you can have sex without romance, and romance without sex. Regardless, we all got shipped home for treatment and the brass didn't let any of us go back. Got assigned to teach new marine snipers then they gave me a solo mission. Williams is a drill instructor now, I’m proud of her.”

"You're alive, so the solo mission went well?"

Petra gave a small snort. "It did at first. Right up until the people I was watching got wind that I was there and tried to kill me. It wasn’t even my fault either, it was a slip up from up the chain." Propping herself up on one elbow, Petra realised something. “You know, we’ve been dating for a while now and I’m still not entirely sure how you know seemingly everything.”

“When you remember everything you see perfectly well, it's difficult not to."

“Oh right, I sometimes forget that you have a photographic memory.”

Hanji nodded. “It made studying very easy. And I have trouble sleeping so that gave me more time to study.”

“What _did_ you study?”

“I have a Masters in Biology. Specialised in human genetics, biochemistry and biophysics.”

“That explains how you know so much about anatomy. But you used to work at Barrett and in weapons research for the military, so you have a degree in engineering or something like that?”

“I also completed a double PHD in mechanical and electrical engineering.”

Petra’s mind scrambled to take this new information in. “Wait… how old were you when you went to college?”

“I was 17 when I finished school and went straight to college. All that took me over ten years.”

“That’s incredible.” Petra smiled gently. “You’re incredible.”

Hanji’s cheeks turned the faintest shade of pink and determinedly looked at anything but their partner. “I just liked learning a lot.” After a few moments, they took a deep breath and peered at Petra’s face. “But thank you. You are too. You’ve done many incredible things.” Breaking the eye contact, Hanji rolled off Petra, stretching out on the bed before putting their arms behind their head to support it. “My sister used to text me at random times of the night to make sure I remembered to sleep.”

“Yuuko?"

“Yes.” Hanji cast their eyes downward, almost as if they were slightly ashamed. “I haven’t seen her or my parents in a long time. They all live in Japan.”

“When was the last time you spoke to them?"

"I called them last week. They seem well."

“That’s good!”

Hanji shrugged and twirled a few silky strands of auburn hair between their fingers. “Yuuko and I used to do Skype calls when I was still studying where she would help me study. She didn’t understand any of it but she let me teach her.” They recalled fondly. “It helped a lot, especially for all the anatomy things.”

“Well, people do say that teaching others is the most efficient way to study. Let’s hope we can work as hard as you did when you studied when we’re training. The next few months are going to be _hard_.”

"Speaking of anatomy," Hanji tilted their head to the side and their eyes twinkled, “Do you know what the human body goes through when you have sex?"

Petra couldn't suppress the urge to smile in slight amusement. "What?"

“Most obviously, your core temperature rises and vasocongestion occurs.” Hanji began, very gently thumbing Petra’s cheeks. Moving their hands down, they tapped the area above Petra’s left breast. “Heart rate and blood pressure increases, breathing grows shallow and deep and your muscles contract and spasm sporadically.” The scientist squeezed Petra’s upper arm before moving to tap their index finger against her forehead. “The pituitary gland floods the body with beta-endorphins, oxytocin and vasopressin, the nucleus accumbens and VTA secretes large amounts of dopamine and areas such as the amygdala and cerebrum just… lights up. Fascinating, isn’t it? It almost sounds like you’re dying some violent, horrific death but it’s actually you engaging in sexual intercourse.”

Petra seemed to latch onto one piece of information. “Parts of the brain shuts down?”

“Well not exactly, the blood supply to the left lateral orbitofrontal cortex is dramatically decreased and it’s been proposed that high sexual arousal deactivates the temporal lobe.”

“I’ve heard of the temporal lobe but this is the first I’ve heard of the lateral orbit thing.”

It was hard not to appreciate the sparkling in Hanji’s eyes. “The orbitofrontal cortex,” They said, tracing their index finger above Petra’s left eyebrow gently, “Is one of the least understood parts of the human brain but it’s been proposed that it’s involved in processes such as sensory integration, decision making, reasoning and muscular control.” Hanji moved their hands to pat the sides of Petra’s head. “The temporal lobes are mainly involved in the retention of visual memories, language recognition, the processing of sensory input and the storage of short and long term memories.”

Petra narrowed her eyes playfully and quirked an eyebrow. "Were you thinking this while we were having sex?"

"No?" Hanji offered sheepishly, expression and tone of voice suggesting the exact opposite.

"It _is_ kind of fascinating. Care to tell me more?"

Hanji’s entire face lit up and they shot upright into a sitting position. "Did you know that sexual intercourse typically has four distinct phases?"

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 1357 HOURS, 24 NOVEMBER 2011**

Over two months has passed, with the vigilantes-to-be training hard and _still_ training hard. Rico was very proud of their progress: Annie was now back in the healthy weight range, along with Christa’s and Ymir’s. Mikasa had happily settled into a non-gang life and Zara had finally worked out all the kinks in their system. Everything was starting to feel right, and Hanji even managed to work out some extra time for a new project that only Hanji, Rico, Mikasa and Zara knew about. Rico’s contact had even finished up Ymir’s sword, which she was now delivering.

“Ymir!” Rico called from the foot of the stairs. “Your sword is here. It’s based off Swedish design as you requested.”

Throwing down the stick she was holding, Ymir all but sprinted over to the weaponmaster and tugged the black bag off their shoulder.

“Okay, this is a deadly weapon and quite honestly, the crafting is excellent. The length should give you optimal control over your fire.” Rico said as Ymir untied the bag and pulled out the weapon. Unsheathing it, her eyes widened comically.

“This is so fucking cool.” The pyrokinetic breathed. Swinging it around, she began to make lightsaber noises.

“It’s not a toy!” Rico called hurriedly.

“Oh come on, man!” Ymir laughed. “I have a freaking sword! Let me have a little fun with it before you whip my ass in training again!”

Hanji had to agree with Rico’s assessment of the sword. The sheath was matte black and had two thick back straps at different points of the sheath to prevent the weapon from jostling around too much when its owner moved. The blade itself was identical to Svante Nilsson crafting, but the colour was an unusual dark grey that had hints of blue when it caught the light. The handle was completely black and was long enough that Ymir could comfortably wrap both hands around it. At first glance, Hanji was dubious about whether Ymir was strong enough to use it but the now considerable size of her arms and shoulders as well as how easily she controlled it put those concerns to rest. Ymir really had come a long way from when they first met.

“Alright, alright, but how’s the balancing?”

“Great? Feels better than all the other ones I tried before. It’s not as heavy as I expected it to be too.”

“Despite their size, most swords aren't too heavy. This one’s almost two kilograms, so you’re still going to need to practice running around with it on your back a lot. You also need to learn how to adjust your movements so you don’t snap your spine on that sword.”

“And it won’t warp when it exposed to significant amounts of heat over extended periods of time?” Hanji inquired, stepping closer to examine the blade in more detail.

“It’s fireproof alright.”

“Did they do a lot of testing?”

“More like they put a tester blade and hilt into the furnace for about eight hours. Took it out and the only thing that changed was some slight charring on the hilt. Did it for about a week and nothing changed. It’s fine.”

“So… what if I do this?”

Ymir lit her empty hand and ran it over the blade. As soon as the flames touched the metal, the blade crackled to life and the pyrokinetic yelled in triumph.

“This is officially the coolest fucking thing that has happened so far!” Laughing, Ymir took a few steps back and began to swing it around again. No one expected what was going to happen next.

Ymir performed a particularly violent thrust and with a loud roar, a powerful jet of fire shot out of the end of the sword and its wielder flew backwards.

“ _Stövel!_ ”

Luckily, Ymir had managed to land on one of the thicker training mats and the sword that she let go of slid to a stop a few meters away. Rico bent to pick up the sword and inspect it, and Hanji hurried to help the taller woman up.

"That was fascinating!" The scientist exclaimed as Ymir stood and brushed herself off.

“How is flying backwards fascinating?”

"We have proof that your fire could potentially be used as a means of generating the necessary amount of thrust and lift to achieve flight!”

It took Ymir a few moments to understand. “I can fly?”

“If your fire is powerful enough, you might be able to fly.”

The pyrokinetic was momentarily speechless. “I take back what I said. _This_ is the coolest thing."

Hanji nodded enthusiastically. "How tired are you right now?"

"Not even a bit. Why?"

"Do you want to test my theory?"

"Hell fucking yes."

Hanji punched the air in excitement. “Yes! Let’s move to the empty hangar so we don’t accidentally set something on fi-- oh.” They seemed to deflate a little as they remembered something. “I’m supposed to show Mikasa her grappler now.”

The woman in question - who was quietly sitting away from the group - uncrossed her arms with a smile. “Go on, you have plenty of time to show me. We can do it some other day.”

“Are you sure?” Hanji asked uncertainly.

“Yep. Go make Ymir fly.”

“You’re the best, Xena!” Ymir called as she and Hanji moved towards the elevator.

“Think they need a little bit of supervision?” Asked Mikasa.

“A scientist and a pyrokinetic.” Rico commented. “It can’t go wrong if they have a big enough space with the least amount of flammable objects in it.”

“True. Either way, we still need to work on me not killing people accidentally when using Krav Maga.”

“Well, we can do that now and check in on those two later then.”

**TWO HOURS LATER**

“One more time, Ymir.” Hanji repeated. They were both tired from the amount of effort it was taking to get Ymir to fly, and they had only achieved a few seconds of flight in the past two hours. “Focus all your energy on your legs. If you need to, use your hands to fire short bursts of fire to stabilise yourself. We just want you hovering -- not zipping around the roof. Not yet, anyway.”

“I can’t get my legs to work at the same time, Hanji.” Complained Ymir. “I’m not the most coordinated person in here.”

“How about using a vocal cue and a certain motion to activate your fire?”

“Like what?”

Hanji shrugged. “Something that could easily set you into flight mode. Maybe a thrust of your legs?”

Stepping up to the makeshift platform once again, Ymir focused: it was all about trial and error and not giving up, Hanji had said to Ymir after the first few failed attempts.

All Ymir needed was a vocal cue and a motion to help activate her powers.

Right.

“What should my vocal cue be?”

“Something sudden? Or related to fire?”

Ymir could certainly work with something sudden.

With a deep, calming breath, Ymir leaped off the platform once more, making sure to curl up her legs before thrusting them out with a loud declaration.

“Bullshit!”

Ymir’s legs roared to life with fire, raising her altitude just enough for her to safely hover without burning anything beneath her.

And the flames didn’t cut out either, unlike last time.

“Holy shit, I’m flying!”

“Can you move?”

Bravely, Ymir added more power to her legs, balancing herself out with short bursts from the palms of her hands. Hanji was slowly becoming smaller, and Ymir was becoming more and more brave.

When her head nearly collided with the roof of the hangar, Ymir grinned, tilting her body to allow her to lap around the roof with some speed.

“Hanji, this is fucking awesome!”

“And you’re amazing!” Hanji called back, straining their voice so Ymir could hear them over the fire. “Your powers have improved tenfold!”

At this point, Mikasa and Rico had walked in at the right time, greeted with the sight of Ymir flying around the large space with glee.

“I see you managed to achieve your goal.” Mikasa pointed out.

Hanji nodded excitedly. “Ymir’s powers are incredible! Who knew that fire could be so flexible? It makes me wonder if we can achieve more with everybody else’s powers -- but, since you’re here Mikasa, let’s introduce you to my new invention! Meet me on the roof in ten minutes!”

Before Mikasa could respond, Hanji had darted off, presumably to their lab, leaving Mikasa and Rico behind. “How do I even get to the roof?”

“Ask Ymir for a lift?”

**10 MINUTES LATER**

“Alright.” Hanji said as they tightened the last of the straps. “You should be all good to go.”

Mikasa made some small adjustments and turned her forearm around in fascination to study Hanji’s finished grappler. After _many_ failed versions, they had just completed modifying the grappler to the user’s specifications and the both of them were currently standing on the roof of Mikasa’s exercise hangar, where she was about to test the grappler properly for the first time. “It’s beautiful.”

“It was originally going to be more like a grappling gun, but I thought it would be a lot easier to break and might not take the strain as well. The grappler being attached tightly to your forearm gives it a lot more stability and it means you won’t run the risk of crushing any kind of grip if you hold onto it too tightly.”

“How does it work?”

Hanji ran their fingers over the two protruding metal blades at the top of the grappler. “This is the harpoon. It’s magnetic and the firing mechanism should provide enough power to pierce concrete and metal enough so that it has a solid grip on whatever you’ve shot this at.” Turning Mikasa’s hand so that her palm face up, Hanji indicated at a small switch on the underside of the sleeve. “This is the safety catch. When it’s in this position, the grappler won’t fire so before you use it, you have to remember to take it off the safety.” Hanji flicked the small switch and a small light next to it flashed green three times and stopped. “That’s when you know it’s ready to go.”

Mikasa nodded and flicked the switch on and off a few more times. “Sounds simple enough. How do I use it?”

“All you have to do is aim and flex your wrist. The inside of the glove and sleeve has a mechanism that detects the downward motion of your wrist and triggers the harpoon to fire. As soon as it anchors to something, it’ll immediately start pulling you in that direction. The harness that you’re also wearing will make sure that the force is distributed evenly so your whole body moves instead of just jerking your arm forwards. You can also turn your wrist to the side and flex your wrist to release the harpoon and some of the cable to use as a melee weapon if you need to.”

“How did you get enough force to fire this thing into concrete?”

“I cannibalised a few of Rico’s shotguns, snipers and a few other things. Then I modified their firing parts so there’s enough force to launch it.”

“How long is the cable?”

“Eighty meters. I’ve tested almost seventy different types of cables over and over again and this particular one was the one that lasted the longest and was thin enough so that you didn't have a much thicker device attached to your arm.”

Mikasa cast a look around to the nearby buildings. “There.” She pointed towards the barracks. “That’s around sixty, right?”

Hanji nodded. “Just aim and shoot.”

Mikasa took a few steps forward until she was standing at the very edge of the hangar roof and spied Ymir, Annie and Christa watching her from the ground. Christa waved at her.

“You guys almost done? Zara’s just ordered the pizzas and they should be ready in around half an hour.” Annie called up.

“We’ll do one test run now then. We can continue tomorrow if we need to.” Mikasa nodded in agreement at Hanji’s suggestion and readied herself.

“Make sure you don’t swing into the side of a building, Ackerman.” Annie called up to her again.

“Pfff, I know what I’m doing.” Mikasa called back and turned her attention back to the current task. Raising her forearm up, she aimed it to where she thought the grappler would attach to the barracks roof. Taking a deep breath, she bent her knees slightly in anticipation and bent her wrist down.

Almost instantly, the harpoon flew through the air and anchored itself to the very edge of the roof and Mikasa lurched forwards as the cable started to reel her towards the building. However, unbeknownst to her, she had aimed a little too far up and the grapple was only half attached to the edge of the roof so at the middle of her journey, her weight became too much and the grappler dislodged itself from the concrete. Mikasa had barely enough time to throw her arms up before she swung into the side of the barrack wall and fell to the ground with a thump.

Ymir, who flew out of the hangar just in time, immediately burst out laughing, while Christa and Annie could barely conceal their amusement. Annie began to jog over to Mikasa to see how she was.

“Is the grappler okay? Did anything break off?” Hanji called from the top of the other roof.

“I’m fine, thanks.” Mikasa groaned from the ground.

“Oh please, you were hit by a train and that only broke a few bones. That fall wasn’t going to hurt you.” Annie said amusedly as she reached Mikasa. She offered Mikasa her hand and helped her up.

Mikasa grumbled something inaudible and checked the grappler. “I think everything’s alright!” She called to Hanji, who had telekinetically hovered down from the roof and was now jogging over to her.

“Good. And I trust that you’re okay?” Hanji asked when they reached her.

“Yeah I’m all good.”

“Excellent. Want to try that again but just aim somewhere up this wall here?”

Mikasa nodded and aimed halfway up the wall before firing. This time, Mikasa was hauled up to the middle of the wall and she hung there, left arm attached to the wall and she braced her feet against the concrete. “All good, but how do I release the grapple?”

"Radial deviation of your wrist should do it."

Mikasa gave Hanji a blank look. “Flick your hand to the right.” The scientist reworded.

Mikasa did as she was told and was back on the ground in a second. “That went much better.”

“It was a lot less entertaining though.” Annie quipped, earning a gentle jab in the ribs from Mikasa.

“Right, now you just need to practice your aim and fluidity when moving, and I need to teach you the different parts and how to maintain it yourself.”

“Are we going to do that tomorrow?”

Hanji shrugged. “We can if you want.”

“Might as well do it while I still have this experience fresh in my mind.”

“Good. Please remind me when we’re in my lab to make a note of a few alterations to your outfit.”

“How is my outfit going?”

“It’s almost finished actually. It would be finished by now but because Ymir’s took us so long, we had to stop working on yours for a little while.”

“All your fault, firefox.” Jabbed Annie.

“Blow me, big nose.”

“I’m glad that the progress with Ymir’s suit took so long!” Hanji interjected. “It means she’s improving at a rapid rate! And I might also have some equipment for you, Annie!”

“What kind?”

“I’ll tell you more when I’m more positive that I can make it. I don’t want to get your hopes up then let you down.”

Annie shrugged. “Fair enough.” She was about to question when that would be but was interrupted by Zara’s voice coming over the intercom loudly.

“So I’ve just noticed that we haven’t got any popcorn for tonight. I don’t particularly want to put on pants right now, so could one of you very kindly go and get some?”

“I’ll go.” Mikasa volunteered, quickly undoing all the straps on the grappler and pulling it off. “I want to take the car I just modified for a longer test drive. Anyone want to come with me to pick flavours?”

Annie put their hand up slightly. “I will. Knowing you, you’ll just come back with just plain flavoured ones.”

“Not my fault that plain is still the best flavour.” Mikasa handed the grappler to Hanji, who immediately began to check it for damages, and set off in the direction of the barracks. “I’ll just go grab my wallet. Go wait by the car.”

**TWO HOURS LATER**

"Know what I just realised? We completely forgot about our codenames. None of us have one yet."

Spiderman 3 had been chosen as this week’s superhero movie to watch and the credits were currently rolling quietly on the TV screen. Annie stretched her arms over her head, hearing the vertebrae pop as she worked out the kinks in her back and slung her legs over Mikasa’s lap to stretch them. “We obviously can’t use our real names while on duty if we’re keeping our identities a secret.”

“Well, we have been busy with training and putting everything together.” Hanji said. “But everyone must have some sort of idea about what name they would like to use, right?”

"We should call you Commander or something." Ymir suggested, shifting slightly to accommodate Christa adjusting her position on the taller woman's lap. "I mean, you were in the military and you are kind of our leader. Plus, you’re the one who came up with this whole thing for a superhero group."

Hanji opened their mouth and closed it, unsure of what to say for a few moments. “I suppose that could work.”

"If we’re following that train of thought, I could just be known as Sergeant again." Petra shrugged.

“Doesn't sound too bad.”

“What about you? I would find it hard to believe that you haven’t thought of one for yourself already.” Annie asked.

“I was actually thinking through some of the nicknames you've given me and wondering if any of them suited me as a codename.”

"What, are you going to name yourself firefox or something?"

Ymir stopped mid-chew. "Fox doesn’t sound too bad."

Annie rolled her eyes. "How very egotistical of you."

"What?" Ymir shrugged, leaning back into the couch. "I'm hot shit. Literally."

"Yeah, you really are Fox News levels of shit." At this, Ymir lobbed a pillow at Annie and the blonde swatted it away easily.

Eager to stop another potential juvenile prank from either of them, Petra turned to the person next to Annie. "Mikasa, you thought of a name?"

There was a long pause before she responded. "Valkyrie."

"Ooh, shivery." Ymir's comment earned an eyebrow raise from Mikasa.

“Any particular reason why you chose that name?”

Mikasa simply shrugged and didn't give an answer.

“Okay then. What about you, Christa?”

"Widow." She replied instantly.

"Is this because we just watched Spiderman?" Zara questioned, waving a hand at the movie credits on the TV.

Ymir lowered her head and nudged her girlfriend’s cheek with her nose. "Also I hope you're not predicting us getting married then me dying, because that would suck massive balls and that's not your power."

"No, because knowing that a giant spider could be chasing after them might make people think twice about crime." Christa bumped the top of her head against her partner’s chin lightly.

Ymir leaned backwards slightly to give her a horrified look. " _Älskling_ , I love you more than anything but if you turn into a giant spider I'm not coming anywhere near you."

“But that spider would be me!”

“Babe, no.”

“Well if that’s your reaction to a spider, I think I've found a new way to get you out of bed in the morning.”

“If you turn into a spider in our bed, I’m never sleeping in it ever again.”

Petra couldn't help but smile at the light bickering between the pair. Shaking her head slightly, she turned back to the other blonde sibling.

"What about you, Annie?"

"All the good names are copyrighted for electric powered superheroes." Annie grumbled. Mikasa patted the leg that was still on her lap in consolation.

“Won’t stop me from using Oracle though.” Zara said. She stood up from her seat and walked into the kitchen.

“From Batman?”

“Sure is.” She called over her shoulder.

“Why this particular character?”

"Oracle sounds rad because she was a boss as fuck disabled person helping Batman, before you know,” Zara scowled, “Bad writing and plot magic miraculously cured her."

"Not even all the money in the world could restore spinal function right now. I read about what happened, it was total bullshit."

"You can't remove representation like that."

“I know a good name for you.” Mikasa said when an idea dawned on her, squeezing Annie’s knee slightly. “Fury.”

“Where did you pull that from?”

“Greek mythology. It’s rather tame compared to Eastern Asian mythology, considering there’s a Japanese myth where an orgy created Japan and/or the world.”

“I remember nothing from Greek mythology. I barely touched it in school.”

“Well, Zeus is often associated with lightning, and I don't think anyone would appreciate giving you the codename of the God of Gods, and he was known for his fury and that's how I came to Fury.”

“He's also associated with sleeping with anybody, even though it just made Hera even angrier.” Hanji pointed out.

“Yeah well, we're ignoring that part.”

“He also turned into a shower of gold to seduce a woman. I admire that.” Zara noted as she pulled a turkish roll from the bag and cut it in half.

“It’s settled then. I’m using Fury.”

“So we all have names now except for Rico.”

“I’ve already thought of one.”

“What is it?”

“Shadow.”

Mikasa raised her eyebrows. “That’s a little unexpected.”

“Exactly. People would expect a sneaky person with knives, except they get a person with a huge sword who punches you outright.”

“Makes sense when you put it like that.”

“Guys,” Christa spoke up as she suddenly realised something, “We’re going to be covering the entirety of NYC, right? All day, everyday?”

“Yes,” Hanji agreed, “That’s the plan.”

“How are we going to do that? This is a huge city and there’s--” Christa did a quick count. “Eight of us.”

“Seven, actually.” Zara corrected from behind the counter as she slapped three slices of cheese onto a piece of grilled chicken and bread. “I’m not letting any of you touch my children. Especially you, Ymir.”

The woman in question squinted in confusion. “Why not me?”

Zara, who was in the middle of spreading mayonnaise over the cheese, lowered the knife and jar. “You _fried_ the toaster accidentally by touching it.”

Ymir rolled her eyes. “That was one time.”

“ _No_.” Zara’s tone of voice was almost threatening. It did not help that she had started to slice up a tomato at the exact same time.

“Alright, point taken. Don’t touch your computers or you’ll stab me.”

“Glad we understand each other.” Zara smiled sweetly and threw her tomato slices over the mayonnaise.

Reopening a packet of smoked salmon sitting on the bench beside her, the hacker peeled the remaining slices off the back and laid it gently over her increasingly large sandwich. “Anyway, back to the point. You know how I’m the main hacker in a group of people who have been monitoring those anti-defect databases that the authorities have made? Well, instead of getting those that have been tagged to safety, we might be able to start recruiting people from there.”

“My vision put our numbers at around twenty.” Petra spoke up. “Assuming that we get all those extra people through this, how long do you think it will take?”

“You know, they’re averaging around five new ones a week and I’ve been doing this for months now. Plus, we might not find all our future friends from this.” Zara said, her voice slightly muffled as she searched around the cereal cupboard. “Found it.” She moved back towards the kitchen bench with the box of Rice Krispies and before any of them could ask, Zara took a handful of the cereal and sprinkled it over the contents of her sandwich.

“Okay seriously, what the hell are you eating?”

“Sandwich.” Zara replied nonchalantly as she uncapped the bottle of chilli flakes and liberally shook it over her sandwich.

“I’m pretty sure half the kitchen is in that thing.”

“I may or may not have forgotten to eat yesterday, so I’m still hungry even after that pizza. And if this is half of the food that we have, we really need to go grocery shopping.”

Slapping a piece of bread over her sandwich, Zara cut it in half and it wobbled precariously on the plate as she moved back over to the couch and sat down heavily. Everyone watched in anticipation and slight skepticism as Zara picked up one half and took a large bite out of it.

“What does that even taste like?”

Zara chewed quickly for a few seconds, a thoughtful expression crossing her face and she swallowed her mouthful of food. “Needs pickles. And Ymir, can you toast this in a bit? The toaster is still broken."

"I've been toasting everyone's toast for four days!"

"Well don’t break the toaster next time."

Ymir watched in horror as Zara and the sandwich moved back into the kitchen area in search of pickles. “Where did we even find her?”

Rico, who was watching Zara tinker around the kitchen with a spark of fondness in their eye, simply shrugged. “She found me.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 1357 HOURS, 10 DECEMBER 2011**

“ _\-- Reports are flooding in and it appears that the vehicle chase that started almost half an hour ago has ended horrifically. The truck and several squad cars have smashed into a line of traffic and has taken out some of the bridge supports. There is currently a very large pile up on the bridge and the damaged section is slowly crumbling.  There have been reports of large fires from wrecked engine blocks, and the gasoline that has soaked the bridge have given the fire brigade a reason to pause. The windy conditions and instability have given emergency services a very delicate and difficult task to perform. We will keep you regularly updated on the emergency as it unfolds._ ”

“Shit… that looks really bad.” Ymir remarked as she moved to stand in front of the TV.

“They’re going to have a hard time moving all those cars and getting to people with the bridge so unstable.”

“They might have an easier time if someone with super strength stepped in to help.”

Every pair of eyes in the room turned to look at Mikasa. Unfazed by this, she continued. “Or someone who could fly people off that bridge. That petrol will have to be removed first though and telekinesis is probably the easiest way to do that.”

“She’s right.” Ymir agreed. “That bridge isn’t too far from here. We could all be ready and there in fifteen minutes if Mikasa drives.”

“Well the two of you can’t do everything on your own.”

“Wait,” Hanji interrupted, “Are you just joking around or actually being serious?”

“We’re being serious here. We could go help.”

“Are we ready for this?” Hanji asked slowly.

“Come on, what better way to make an introduction? It’ll be the first time the public see us, and we’ll be saving people. We can totally do this.”

Hanji recognised the obvious and fierce determination on Ymir’s face and glanced around to the rest of the team. All of them had similar expressions on their face and thinking back to a few months ago, the scientist was suddenly hit by how much each person had grown in such a short period of time.

With their mind half made up, Hanji shot Petra a questioning look. The ex-Marine nodded slightly and with that, Hanji made their decision.

“Alright everyone! You have ten minutes to get changed and meet in the garage. Zara, make sure all the headsets are connected and I want you to tap into all the cameras near and on the bridge. And make sure all the heat cameras in all masks are working, could help with identifying any trapped people.” Pause. "Also everybody should note that while we do have outfits, they are not entirely complete yet! At least, they protect our identities!"

“Aye aye, Commander.”

Turning back to the rest of the group, who hadn't moved, they clapped their hands together. “Come on, you've only got almost nine minutes left!”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> here's a really high res reference of ymir's sword: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d9/The_Svante_Nilsson_Sture_Sword_05.jpg


	8. Operation: Iron and Steel

** NEW YORK CITY, 1414 HOURS, 10 DECEMBER 2011 **

“Alright,” Hanji started, “we’re going to be splitting into teams. Medical team is Sergeant, Widow and Fury, with team lead being Shadow. Prioritise injuries, with no breathing and spinal injuries being number one. Form a triage, and co-ordinate with the on-site EMTs.”

Annie furrowed her brows behind the mask. “Why am I part of the medical team?”

“You’re pretty much a walking talking defibrillator unit.”

There was a moment’s pause. “Good point.”

“The second team will be structure team. Structure team is Fox, Valkyrie and team lead being myself. We are to focus on removing unstable elements and stabilise the bridge for better accessibility without endangering any more lives. Oracle will be co-ordinating with both teams.”

“Plan of action?”

“Structure team will head in first. I will try to remove any petrol or flammable fluids before Fox heads in, who will try to restabilise the bridge via welding or any other form. If medical team needs something heavy removed, you will call Valkyrie.”

“Okay that’s fine and all,” Ymir interjected, voice wavering noticeably as Mikasa took a corner quickly, “But won’t the emergency people give us the stink eye or something? Because we’re just, ‘yo, hey, we just did some weird illegal shit and we’re doing your job for you’ kind of thing.”

“Remind them that there are lives in danger and injuries that need to be addressed and then carry on.” Rico answered. “We don’t have time for petty things like that.”

“You’d think that it wouldn’t even be a concern when people’s lives are in danger.” Annie scoffed as she tightened the straps of her mask. She shook her head from side to side quickly, making sure it was secure before pulling up her hood.

“We’ll be there in less than a minute, so if you’re not ready yet then you might want to hurry.” Even from this distance, the occupants of the vehicle could make out the throngs of people who had gathered near the bridge and the numerous rescue vehicles and workers.

“We’re all good back here.” Hanji confirmed. “Time to show the world what we can do.”

**SIX MINUTES LATER**

Battalion Chief Miller heaved a sigh internally as he catalogued the scene in front of him silently.

_Thirty four car pile up, gasoline all over the bridge, god knows how many more people stuck and the bridge collapsing under our feet… this isn’t going to be easy at all._

Sweeping his gaze again over the scene quickly, he began to address the emergency workers gathered before him. “Alright, first we have to make sure that -- what is that?”

All heads and cameras suddenly turned towards a specific portion of the bridge, where gasoline had begun to rise slowly into the air. It converged into a large ball before snaking its way over the the overturned tanker and sliding back into it through the holes before the holes were forcefully wrenched together by some unseen force.

“What the hell is happening and who’s doing that?!”

“I don’t know sir, but we’ll find out!” The firefighter pulled out his communications device but stopped when the damaged section groaned loudly and straightened out.

“Did that just _move on its own?_ ”

“It… appears so, sir.”

On the bridge, several people screamed as they felt the bridge under them shift, the loose parts cracking and groaning before unwillingly stabilising.

Meanwhile, on the opposite end of the bridge, Hanji had their arms out and fingers splayed. “Alright everyone, don’t know how long I’ll be able to hold this for so do what you need to to do quickly.”

With Ymir’s lazy salute and stiff nods from the rest of the group, they all leapt into action. Mikasa sprinted ahead of the group, arriving at the cluster of smashed and empty cars blocking way onto the bridge, pulling them all aside quickly to let the others through.

“Alright, split up into your groups and get to work!” Petra shouted. “Remember to assess the situation first before prioritising the injuries! You’re no help if you get injured yourself!”

Mikasa, who had moved ahead slightly, turned to show that she had heard Petra’s words and went back to clearing a path.

Most of the cars Mikasa had encountered were already empty, thankfully, presumably with the occupants evacuating as soon as they had the chance. Soon enough, she had almost cleared a path to the ambulances and was close enough to notice all the nervous looks directed her way. She took a few steps in the direction of another vehicle blocking the path when her radio crackled to life.

“Valkyrie? You there?”

Mikasa flicked a switch on the underside of her mask. “Yes, what’s wrong?”

There was a pause. “I’ve found a woman who looks like she got her head smashed against the dashboard and she’s slipping in and out of consciousness. I think we need to move her as quickly as possible but I also can’t carry her without her neck being completely unsecured. She’s also trapped and we don’t have anything to pry her out, except you.”

She cast a glance at Rico, who nodded wordlessly. Mikasa clambered onto the roof of a neighbouring Jeep and cast a look around. “Describe the car you’re at now.”

“Uh, it’s a black… Chrysler? I think.”

“Send up a bolt of electricity so I can see you.”

Almost immediately, a pillar or white energy shot up into the air and, keeping her eyes on it, Mikasa jumped off the car and sprinted over to Annie and Christa. The car had been rear ended by another vehicle, and was pressed up against a support column. Peering into the car, she understood why they were so anxious to get her to safety.

“Her cheek and eye socket looks like it’s in pieces.”

“If she hit the dashboard with that much force, we don’t know if she has any neck injuries, so I need your help to move her. Plus, she’s trapped.” Christa said, twisting her hands together nervously.

“We don’t have a neck brace or a backboard or anything, what are we going to do?”

“Well, we need to get her out first.” Annie pointed out.

Glancing back to the woman in the car, she saw that she had begun to awaken again. “I’ll go rip the roof off so we can get her out, then use it as a backboard. I’ll get ready and you have to talk to her.”

“And prep her for the backboard, I assume.” Annie, thankful that the entire front end of the car had been ripped off, she pulled off what was left of the windshield and leaned through, securing the woman’s head. “Don’t panic and don’t move. You’re safe, we just have to get you out. Can you tell me your name?”

The woman just groaned in reply.

“Lovely.”

“I’m off, then. You guys don’t need me here.” With that, Christa swiftly turned and flew off in the opposite direction, aerially hunting for more trapped passengers.

Mikasa, careful not to bend the roof, slowly pried the roof from the body. It was already too large to fit behind the woman’s back, so she ripped it in half horizontally before taking a bit more off the top. Desperate times called for desperate measures.

Climbing into the backseat, Mikasa carefully maneuvered the improvised backboard behind the woman, praising the various Gods that the woman was already sitting up. “Are you getting uncomfortable, Fury?”

“Not for a long while.”

Using the knife Rico had assigned her, she cut the woman free of her seat belt before using it as the first improvised rope to tie her to the backboard. Cutting the other seat belts free of the car, Mikasa further secured the woman before taking a seat behind her again.

“On three I’m going to remove the back of her seat so we can start lowering her down.”

“Ready.” Annie responded, leaning further into the car.

“Three.” Ripping off the back of the driver’s side seat, Mikasa replaced it with herself, slowly lowering the woman down with Annie’s hands being replaced by Mikasa’s.

“Use the headrests and the last of the cut seatbelt to secure her head.” Mikasa suggested, nodding towards the wrecked seat and the cut seatbelt.

Once the woman’s head was secure, Annie moved out of the way to allow Mikasa to pick the woman up and balance her carefully above her head.

“Run ahead and alert the EMTs that we have a face injury with a possible neck injury, and they should prepare a proper backboard. I’ll be right behind you.”

Annie nodded and picked up what she assumed was the woman’s bag from the mangled front seat.

“Alright, got it. Giddy up, Valkyrie, we don’t have all day.”

Because neither of them wanted to risk further injury even with the neck brace, the trek to the ambulances was a slow one. By the time they reached the vehicles, both of them were acutely aware of the throngs of staring bystanders and the emergency response personnel who had backed away slightly, looking slightly fearful. There were only a few that hadn’t started staring, and Annie moved over the the one closest to them and called out to him.

“We’ve got a woman coming in that we found unconscious in her car. Looks like she’s broken her cheekbone and eye socket, possibly concussed and don’t know if she has a spinal or neck injury.”

The medic was speechless for a few moments but shook himself eventually. “Okay, did you manage to get her name or any personal details?”

“I asked what her name was and she didn’t reply, but we did get what I think is her bag.” Annie handed the bag over to the EMT. “A person named Valkyrie will be carrying her here on an improvised backboard.”

A smaller man approached, his EMT jacket almost dwarfing him, with a look of disgust on his face. “Why would we need freaks like you helping us?”

Annie’s face hardened under her mask and she turned her head towards him: in response, he took a step back. “Because unlike you, we’ve actually gone out and did something incredibly dangerous to save people’s lives. We just removed all the gas from the bridge. We pulled trucks out of your way. We can rip open cars without machinery, saving precious seconds that they may not have. We can help. How about we all focus on saving these people, and then you can go back to being a judgemental prick afterwards, you spineless little _coward_.” At the pronunciation of the final word, Annie was right in the man’s personal space.

The man swallowed noticeably, his eyes travelling down fixate on the energy that had sparked to life at her fingertips and nodded minutely.

“Glad we got that out of the way.” Mikasa chirped in, carrying the improvised backboard above her head with ease. “Anyway, I have a semiconscious woman with facial injuries, and possible neck injuries!”

“Oh Christ,” the first EMT breathed and immediately called for a stretcher and a proper neck brace. As soon as they arrived, Mikasa moved the woman gently onto the stretcher and walked a few steps away to answer a call from Ymir. Mikasa nodded in understanding, and Annie clapped her on the shoulder. “I’m going back my team. Stay safe.”

Annie and the EMT both watched Mikasa vault over a 4x4 before they turned their attention back to each other.

“Thank you,” the EMT said genuinely. “If you could further assist in getting these people out, it would be much appreciated.”

Annie’s radio crackled to life and Rico’s voice filtered through clearly. “Fury? You with anyone right now?”

“No I’m not, what do you need?” Annie answered, giving a thumbs up to the EMT before turning on her heel and walking back to the line of cars. Climbing onto on, she looked around briefly and spotted her teammate.

“I have a woman here who’s surrounded by electrical wires and she’s refusing to move.” Hearing the urgency in Rico’s voice, Annie jumped down hurriedly and began to run.

“The wires are live?”

“Yes. I need you to get her out somehow. Widow’s got a no-breathing no-pulse patient on her hands and I have to go help her.”

“No problem, Shadow, I’ll get right on it.” Annie was close now and seeing this, Rico nodded at her and went off to help Christa. Arriving at the scene, she scanned the situation quickly. The woman’s right leg was doused in blood, and Annie prayed that not all of it was her’s. Her eyes were wide and panicked, her gaze darting back and forth between the sparking electrical wires that had been cut and flung haphazardly over the ground.

“Hey!” Annie called, leaning down a little and holding her hands up. “Can you hear me?”

The woman’s head jolted upwards at the sound of Annie’s voice and she whimpered loudly. From what Annie could tell, she was shaking badly and her face was wet from both tears and sweat. The electrokinetic took a few more tentative steps forward and the woman curled back into herself, making Annie stop immediately. “Can you tell me your name?”

The woman opened her mouth to respond but let out a scream as one of the electric wires crackled loudly and sparked. She began to cry and Annie barely managed to make out her words around the sobs.

“I’m going to die here I’m going to get electrocuted to death here--”

“Not you’re not! I’m going to get you out of here alive, I promise.”

“How? You’ll probably get electrocuted if you try to get any closer too!”

“I can control it. I’ll get these away from you and I can help you get to the EMTs on the other side of the bridge.”

Moving slowly to prevent scaring the woman further, Annie stepped forward and gathered a few loose wires in her hands. The electricity greedily jumped to her limbs and she absorbed them, feeling her whole body tingle and vibrate as she took it in. Quickly moving them a good distance away, she repeated the process for all the other wires until they were all at least a good ten meters from the woman. In the time it had taken for Annie to move the wires, she seemed to have calmed down slightly and was now watching her with wide eyes. Her eyes widened more as Annie approached her again slowly and knelt down in front of her.

“They won’t be able to hurt you now. Are you able to stand?”

The woman gulped audibly before responding. “It hurts to use my right leg.”

“I’ll help you stand and get you back to the EMTs.”

“How do I know you won’t electrocute me?”

Annie glanced around. “I’ll go put both of my hands on that car. If I’m not in control, I’ll end up frying the car but if I am in control, nothing will happen. Will that give you some reassurance?”

The woman nodded slowly after a few moments of contemplation and Annie made her way quickly over to a nearby green car. After making sure the woman had a clear line of sight, she laid her hands slowly on the hood of the car. As expected, no electricity arced from her hands to the metal of the car and she removed her hands after a few seconds.

“See?” Annie gestured at the car. “Still intact. Are you comfortable with me helping you now?”

The woman gave a single nod.

Looking into the window of the car she previously rested her hands on, she saw a jacket that was large enough to use as a pseudo-bandage. As she broke into the vehicle, she continued to talk to the injured woman.

“Now can you tell me your name?”

“Rose.”

With the jacket retrieved, Annie addressed the woman again. “Alright, now what I want you to do is lay down, because you’re going to elevate your leg while I bandage it up. Then we’re going to find a way to move you without ripping your cut further. You understand?”

Rose did as she asked, laying down on the currently shrapnel free tarmac and elevating her injured leg. In turn, Annie tied the jacket around the wound tight enough to efficiently work as a bandage.

Now with Rose stabilised, she flicked on her mic.

"Widow, are you nearby? I could use some transport right now."

Annie could clearly hear her breathing in the background but her sister remained silent, her anxiety mounting by the second.

“Widow?” Still nothing. “Widow? _Widow_ , what’s going on? Are you hu--”

“I couldn’t save him.”

The reply was so quiet that Annie almost couldn’t hear her. Christa’s voice wavered violently, as if she was on the verge of breaking down.

“Widow…”

“He was declared dead by an on-site medic a minute ago. I couldn’t even give CPR.”

Shit. Annie wasn’t very good at this touchy-feely emotional stuff. “You did the best you can. He wasn’t alone in death. You’re still alive right?”

“Yeah.” Christa’s tone was still downtrodden.

“One loss compared to the piles of people we’ve saved. You’re still alive, and that means you can still help, so get over here and help me transport someone who’s got a gash on her leg the size of my hand.”

That speech could’ve been better, but Annie would take it.

A sigh was overheard over the communications system, before Christa spoke again. “I strongly disagree with what you said, with ‘just one loss’ and all, but I haven’t the energy to argue right now. Where are you?”

“Get up in the air and look for two minivans with thick dead wiring near them. We’re there.”

As they helped person after person leave the bridge, time seemed to blur around them and events eventually began to melt into one another. The group worked seamlessly together, their actions becoming more confident and Rico paused to catch her breath eventually, leaning against a car and admired the way Mikasa and Ymir wordlessly welded several pieces of a single support beam together. Christa jogged past her quickly on four legs with a person clinging to her back. A woman and a young boy trailed behind, hobbling slowly along. The woman had two makeshift wrist braces and the boy was limping noticeably.

“My legs really hurt, mama.” The boy winced and tugged on his mother’s jacket.

“I’m sorry sweetie, I can’t carry you.”

”I can.” Rico offered, pushing off the car.

The mother eyed Rico warily for a few seconds before glancing at her child. “I would very much appreciate it if you could, thank you.”

The boy was staring at Rico’s mask in both awe and hesitation, so the weaponmaster walked over to him slowly and knelt down so they were a more similar height.

“Hi there. What’s your name?”

“Jake.” The boy replied slowly.

“Hi Jake. I can’t tell you my name, but you can call me Shadow. Would you let me carry you over to the ambulances? It would make you legs hurt less.”

He nodded and Rico carefully picked him up, being mindful of the bruising and nasty scrapes that ran down his calves and across his knees. Rico knew it was unwise to heal his injuries without proper sterilization, so she settled on making it so that the pain in his legs was as minimal as she could.

“Why do you only have one eye hole?”

“Trust me kid, you don’t want to see my other eye.”

“You’re cool, like Deathstroke.” He paused. “But you help people, not kill them.”

Rico chuckled quietly and adjusted her grip on the boy. “Ninety five percent of the time, yes. Can you do me a favour?”

The boy perked up. “Yeah?”

“Under my chin, there’s a little button on the left side. Can you push it for me please?”

He eagerly did as she asked and Rico nodded in thanks. “How are you holding up, Commander?”

Rico’s question was met with static. “Commander?” She frowned, looking up as Christa abruptly changed into a bird and sped off in Hanji’s direction. “You there?”

Hanji’s laboured breathing filled her ears. “Hurry.”

Mikasa, who was listening in, swore under her breath. “Oracle, can you see how many are left?”

“Just the two Sergeant’s taking back to the EMT’s. Everyone’s off the bridge now so you might be able to get out of there.”

“I’m at Commander’s position now, and we really need to get back to base as soon as possible.” Behind the urgency in Christa’s voice, they could all hear Hanji wheezing in the background.

“I’ll go tell the authorities tha--”

Loud, frantic beeping snapped Mikasa from her sentence. One of the trucks that had driven in with equipment had driven over a particularly unstable part of the bridge, and was now struggling to gain any traction on the now crumbling road. Mikasa barely had time to react and sprint to the truck, grabbing the winch and the front bumper before it completely toppled over the edge of the bridge. The front of the truck groaned in protest at the tremendous opposing forces and Mikasa grit her teeth before giving a great heave, attempting to pull the engine back onto the bridge. Infuriatingly, the engine refused to move.

“Fox! You have to help me here!”

At the sound of Mikasa’s strained voice, Ymir, who was also beginning to head over to Hanji, immediately did a turn in the air and landed with a flurry of flames.

“What do you need?”

“The truck’s caught on something and I can’t lift it. See if you can get under the end of it and move it up so we can pull it back.”

Ymir glanced at the trapped firefighters. “I’m going to move them all first. They could die if we slip up.”

“No time!” The winch Mikasa was gripping onto buckled, causing her to punch a dent into the front of the truck so she could find a new place to grip. “The truck is going to give before I do!”

At this, Ymir took a running leap off the side of the bridge with the help of a muttered profanity, and activated her flames to come to a stop right under the back of the dangling truck. “Alright, in position!”

“Just fly upwards as much as you can!”

Taking a deep breath to steel herself, Ymir pressed her hands and upper back to the bottom of the vehicle and focused all her energy. Fire roared as everything from her shoulders down was engulfed with flames and immediately, she could feel the force of her flames lift the truck into a horizontal position. “Valkyrie, you better start pulling before I snap my spine!”

With a loud war cry like yell, Mikasa dragged the truck back onto the bridge and to a spot where it would not block the clear route off the structure. She swayed on her feet slightly as soon as she let go of the truck but Ymir appeared beside her in a flash, laying a steady hand on her shoulder and directing her a look of concern that Mikasa caught even through the black mask. Mikasa grimaced and gingerly closed her left hand into a fist. She suspected that she had broken a few fingers thanks to the sharp edge of the hole that she punched into the engine. The firefighters that they had just rescued had quickly scrambled out of the truck and took it upon them just to simply stare at Mikasa and Ymir.

“I’m alright, how are you doing?”

“Uh, not entirely sure right now.” Ymir’s apprehensive tone made Mikasa straighten up to see seven handguns pointed in their direction. Instinctively, she raised her hands into the air.

“Get on the ground now!” The officer closest to them yelled.

A loud, feral growl caused them all to flinch, jerking backwards as a huge wolf with a still figure on its back snarled and moved to stand next to Ymir.

“Commander.” Mikasa breathed as she recognised the person clinging to Christa’s back. Before the officers had time to recover, the remaining members of the group quickly rushed over and moved to stand protectively around a vulnerable Hanji.

“Put your hands in the air, and get on the ground! Do it now!” Even through their hazy vision, Hanji could make out the nervous shaking of the policeman’s hands. The amount of panic and fear in the air as well as the exhaustion that they could feel in every single bone made it hard to reign in their telepathy.

_“Holy shit that one is really strong!”_

_“That one can fly with fire! We won’t be able to catch it if it flies away!”_

_“What the fuck was that one doing? The bridge should've fallen by now!”_

_“Is that a wolf? Is that a domesticated wolf?”_

_“Is that… electricity? Crackling off it’s arms?”_

_“Oh God. That’s a sword. Lord help me.”_

_“The fuck? Did that one just appear out of thin air?”_

“Commander?” Mikasa said quietly. Judging by the lack of reaction from the officers, Hanji assumed that they had switched mics and the police could not hear a word that they were saying now. Flicking a small button on the underside of their mask, Hanji let out a shaky breath. “What is it?”

“Oracle’s just confirmed that there are no more people left that are trapped. We can leave now.”

“Good.” Hanji laid their cheek back down into warm grey fur. “Everyone, stay as close as possible to me as you can. I’ll cast an illusion so they just space out. Everyone move quickly because I’m using the last of my energy for this and I’m blanking everybody’s minds.”

“Gotcha.” Ymir minutely shifted her stance. “Ready when you are.”

Everyone’s concern over their obviously weakened state washed over them, and Hanji grimaced. Slowly, the police surrounding them all holstered their weapons, all looking into the same blank space. The civilians stopped talking too, the incessant flashing of their technology all stopping at once as Hanji emptied their minds momentarily.

“Get moving!” Hanji called, and Christa immediately started running for the car. The group followed shortly behind with none of them being able to match Christa’s speed and started to move towards the gap in the vehicles quickly, passing the the officers who still staring off into space.

Hanji began to shake with the exertion of maintaining the illusion and sensing the painful grip on her fur, Christa skidded to a stop in front of the car, yanked it open with her teeth and unceremoniously shoved them in.

They blacked out.

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 1149 HOURS, 11 DECEMBER 2011**

Hanji wasn’t quite sure which woke them up first; the pounding in their head, the sweat that made their clothes stick to their skin or the loud buzzing of the thoughts of everyone in the general vicinity. Dimly, they felt Rico cursing over something and Christa concentrating intently on the memory exercises that she had been doing and made a note to continue with the sessions as soon as they were able to. The telepath wasn’t entirely sure they could get out of bed right now.

They groaned, and person next to the shifted and drew closer. Rolling onto their back, Hanji rubbed a hand over their eyes and coughed.

Petra put her book down and helped her partner prop themselves up onto some pillows. “Good morning. I didn’t know how you would feel but I have some water and painkillers here if you need it.”

Hanji accepted the proffered medication and downed it with the entire glass of water. “Where are we?”

“Back at the base. You’ve been asleep for almost sixteen hours.”

“I was awake before?”

“You don’t remember?” Hanji’s blank look was a sufficient enough answer.

“Right. You fainted after we got back to the car and woke up not long after we got back. You fell asleep pretty soon after that though.”

“My head feels very odd.” Hanji’s stomach growled loudly. “And I’m hungry.”

“You’ve been asleep for a long time.” Petra got up from the bed and kissed her partner’s forehead. “There’s some leftover pasta in the fridge because Zara actually made us food. I’ll go reheat it for you and get Rico.”

Petra exited the room, the door clicking closed quietly behind her and Hanji closed their eyes and leaned back against the pillows. They raised a fist and tapped on their skull none too gently, attempting to clear their mind but stopped when pain radiated across their skull. Gently rubbing the point of impact, Hanji instead opted to count backwards from one hundred slowly. They had reached fifty nine before they heard the sound of the door opened quietly again, purple and gold streaking through their mind.

Without opening their eyes, Hanji spoke up first. “How are you, Rico?”

“I feel like I should be asking you that question.” Rico said, crossing her arms and leaning against a wall. “And I’m absolutely fine.”

Hanji shrugged lightly and finished counting before answering. “Very tired and hungry. Petra’s gone to get me some food.”

“That’s understandable, since you pretty much kept an entire section of that bridge from crumbling.”

“That… makes sense. Would you believe carrying an entire bridge plus the vehicles plus the people on it would be incredibly heavy? I did it! It just… hurt after a while.”

“You did a great job, Hanji.”

“How is everyone else?”

“None of us got hurt. Everyone’s just tired, mostly.”

“Has the news said anything about us?”

The healer gave a short laugh. “Well, we’ve been plastered on the front of every newspaper and every news broadcast has mentioned us at least once every time they’re on air. It’s actually pretty difficult to avoid hearing about us and what happened yesterday.”

“What’s the general public opinion?”

“Half are calling us heroes and and the other half wants us locked up. Which is only slightly surprising. We’re also trending on Twitter.”

“Have the authorities said anything yet?”

“Oddly enough, no they haven’t. No one has released a statement yet but we’ve already been given a name.”

“A name?”

“Yeah, a group name.”

“What is it?”

“The TITANS. It’s not bad, if you ask me.”

Hanji was silent for a few moments, mulling over the name. “Agreed. At least it’ll save us the effort of thinking of a name.”

“Everyone’s also wondering when we’ll make our next appearance.”

“Well that depends on what everyone else in the group thinks. Plus, we don’t have enough people for regular patrols yet.”

“Zara’s working on that now. She thinks she might have two by the end of this week.”

Hanji closed their eyes tiredly. “Good. We really need to get moving.”

“Mikasa and I need to come up with a general training regime, so that’ll give us some time. Don’t worry yourself too much about it. Zara knows exactly what he’s doing and Petra will know who we need to take in.”

“I assume that Zara has already worked out all the intricacies of the plan.”

“He has, and all you have to do is what he tells you to.”

Hanji swung their legs off the bed and made to stand up, and Rico pushed herself off the wall and raised a questioning eyebrow. “Not now. You need to rest.”

“But--”

“No.” The healer interjected. “Take today off. You held a bridge up for over an hour and then held nearly everyone in an illusion after that. Zara hasn’t got anything solid yet and you need to take today off to recharge.”

Hanji wanted to protest, but their legs were already feeling awfully weak without even standing. “Okay. But as soon as Zara has something, please ask him to tell me.”

“I will, don’t worry.”

**ONE HOUR LATER**

“Zara?” Petra called as she quickly rounded the corner into the hacker’s cave. “Hanji’s finally asleep again but you should probably explain how you’re doing with finding our future fellow team members and what their role is as soon as they wake up again. They were pretty insistent on finding out before they fell back asleep.”

Zara, who was still engrossed in… whatever he was doing and ignoring a clearly exasperated Rico, waved a hand behind him. “Yeah, I’ll get on it.”

“Thank you.” Petra replied. Rico let out an annoyed sigh and rubbed their temples.

“Maybe you can talk some sense into Zara.”

“Why? What are you arguing about?”

“Back-up weapons!” Rico exclaimed, one hand disappearing up her shirt for a moment and pulling a bowie knife out of nowhere. “You know how I feel about them, but Zara here doesn’t seem to grasp my point.”

“Yes well, I’m actually not entirely sure why you’re so insistent on having multiple backup weapons.”

Rico pinched the bridge of their nose. “My eye.”

Petra shot her comrade a confused look. “That doesn’t explain much.”

“My team and I were raiding a drug factory. We were all separated and I was caught off guard and ambushed. Four people disarmed me and one managed to stab me in the eye before someone else splashed acid in my face. I got them but as you can clearly see, I didn’t get out completely fine.” Rico explained. “I’m not saying that having another weapon on me would have saved my eye, but it would have given me more of a fighting chance and sometimes that’s all you need.”

Petra thought back to her solo mission gone wrong, remembering the terror that coursed through her veins as she used a cracking tree branch to hold off the knife that had all the intent of burying itself into her throat. “It is a good idea, Zara.”

“Thank you.” Rico said, clapping their hands together.

“I already have a backup weapon though!”

“What do you have?” Petra asked out of curiosity. Zara simply moved his right arm, revealing a bayonet knife taped to his keyboard.

“Puts a new meaning to ‘stick and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me’, doesn’t it?” He joked. In the background, Rico let out a sigh.

“Zara, that’s not what I had in mind-- “ Rico began, but was cut off by the hacker’s loud tuttering.

“Ah ah! I said I would let you teach me how to use it already!”

“Okay seriously, this is between you two. I’ll see you two at dinner.” With that, Petra slid out of the room quickly.

Rico gesticulated helplessly, barely registering Petra’s departure. “Yes, but I do think it would be more beneficial if you--”

“Seriously, I’ll be fine. You don’t need to act like an overprotective spouse.”

Zara turned back to face his screens and missed the slight colouring of Rico’s cheeks. “I’m not acting like an overprotective spouse.”

“An overprotective parent, then.”

“Zara, please.”

Zara huffed and turned back towards the weaponmaster. “A knife is enough, seriously.”

Rico uncrossed her arms and moved closer. “But what if people burst in, guns blazing? A knife isn’t going to do much.”

“Our security is too tight for that to happen.”

Rico rolled her eyes in exasperation. “Please, just consider another weapon? You don’t have to give up the knife, you can just pick a firearm and have that bayonet as a backup.”

Zara hesitated, taking in the pleading and slightly panicked look on Rico’s face and finally nodded. “Alright alright, stop giving me that look.”

Rico suppressed the relieved sigh that almost made its way out. “Any specific kind of weapon that you had in mind?”

“How about a shotgun? I used one a few times at MI6.”

“The Remington 870? Surprisingly I don’t have one of those but I know the _perfect_ alternative.” Rico dashed out of the cave, reappearing a few minutes later with a large three barrelled shotgun cradled in their arms.

“Fucking hell, Rico, where did you get that from?”

“I liberated it from a drug dealer. He must have made it himself or modified something else heavily because this thing is seriously a nasty piece of work. Took off half my arm when he shot me as I tried to wrestle it from him.” They passed the gun to Zara, who turned it around to examine it. “This thing deals massive amount of damage up close with its three barrels and it uses 12 gauge shells. It has excellent firing speed. It doesn’t have the fastest reload rate, but it’s still acceptable.”

“The recoil on this thing must be insane.”

“It’s not as bad as you would think, actually. But it is still pretty significant so if you want to use it, you’re going to have to do some training.”

Zara finished his inspection of the gun and laid it on his lap, turning his attention back to the weaponmaster. “But who’s going to keep an eye on things?”

“Zara, you cannot spend almost every waking hour in here. Your fitness will suffer, your health will suffer and your immunity will suffer. Plus if you keep sitting on that chair without adequate padding, you’re going to get pressure sores, and those aren’t fun.”

As much as Zara wanted to protest, he knew that Rico had a point. “I really hate it when you’re right sometimes.” He grumbled quietly.

“I know what you're like when you have a lot of responsibilities. I’m just trying to look out for you.”

“I know, I know. And I’m glad.”

“You taught us the basic functions of your programs months ago. So when you’re away from the computers, one of us can take over.”

Zara bristled, putting the shotgun down onto the nearest empty flat surface and turned around to face his screens again. Seeing this reaction, Rico moved to stand directly behind the chair.

“I know you have everything set up perfectly, and I know that you need everything to be perfect, but we aren’t going to mess anything up.” She said soothingly, reaching down to squeeze Zara’s tense shoulders. “We’ll only touch what you say we can and we can take care of ourselves. You don’t need to watch everything every second of every day.”

Zara remained silent, so Rico forged on. “All the alarms, the security systems, we all have all the faith in the world that it’ll be able to keep us hidden from the world. And you and I both know that they don’t require the amount of attention that you’re giving to them right now. Just because you monitor them for a few hours less a day doesn’t make them less effective or diminish the sheer amount or quality of the work that you’ve done in the past few months in any way.”

Zara was motionless for a few moments before turning slowly to face Rico and fell forward slightly, resting his forehead against Rico’s stomach.

“You know how to work the cameras?” He eventually asked quietly.

“Of course. I set most of them up and you spent three hours telling me about them, remember?”

“Good, because I _am_ really tired right now.”

Rico began to stroke the back of Zara’s head soothingly. “Go sleep. You haven’t slept in around 27 hours.”

“You’ve been documenting, huh?”

“Well someone has to make sure you don’t keel over, right? Besides, there is no one in this world who can keep this place safe better than you. I really don’t want to have to find a replacement.”

Zara smiled slightly and pressed his face against Rico’s stomach for a few more seconds before straightening up. “Can you give me another backrub later?”

“Of course. I can give you one now so you’ll sleep a little better.”

**SIX HOURS LATER**

"While we are grateful for the assistance that they provided during yesterday’s disaster, the New York Police Department does not condone any more vigilante actions or behaviour. The NYPD is more than capable of--”

“It took them long enough to release an official statement.” Christa noted.

“Well, at least they’re not going out of their way to look for us. Being black is enough reason for them to incite a witch hunt, _so…_ ” Mikasa said.

“Kinda the least they can do after what we did, right? And any idea when Hanji’s up to joining us for a debrief?”

“Hanji’s very overstimulated right now, and judging by how much energy they used yesterday we don’t know how long it’s going to take for them to calm down.” Petra said. “They said to just do it without them and relay the information back to them later.”

“That works too.”

“Anyone have anything they would like to bring up?” Rico asked.

“Yesterday really highlighted a few quite obvious gaps in our plan.” Petra began.

Rico put their fork down and clasped their hands together. “Such as?”

“Well, the only two people who have any other means of transport is Ymir and Christa because they can fly.” Petra pointed out. “Even Annie is limited because she needs to get up to a high point before she can glide down. The rest of us are limited to going around on foot or driving or taking public transport, and we can’t take public transport if we’re going out on patrols.”

Ymir snorted around a mouthful of potatoes. “Can you imagine hearing about a bank robbery in progress but not being able to get there because of six o’clock traffic?”

“And I’ve only just started learning how to do the gliding thing.” Annie interjected. “It’s really tiring too at the moment.”

“Can’t you also like, propel yourself along electric wires?”

“I can, but I still have to work on not creating a blackout whenever I do that.”

“I’ve got a few cars and motorcycles in the garage that I can modify. Whoever can’t get around on their own for the entire time can use one of them. Just tell me and I’ll get started on them.”

“I’m so glad that I can fly.” Ymir piped up. “Saves me the hassle of driving.”

“Do you even have a license?”

“No, but I’m still glad I don’t have to take a car everywhere.”

“Do you have a problem with them?”

Ymir slouched over the table and picked at her food, sighing quietly. “I hate cars.”

“You’re going to have to get used to one.”

“I know, I know.” The pyrokinetic grumbled.

“Any particular reason why?”  
  
At first, Ymir looked content with not giving an answer but eventually put down her fork and sighed. “It has something to do with my powers.” Ymir chewed on her food slowly and swallowed before elaborating. “I was sixteen years old. I don’t… I don’t really remember what it was about but I had a massive argument with my dad in the car. He just kept getting angrier so he drove faster and faster. I tried to tell him to slow down but he would just get more mad at me and we’re yelling at each other and the next minute…” Ymir paused. Christa, sensing her partner’s unease, hooked her left ankle around Ymir’s right and leaned against her arm slightly.

Ymir looked down fondly at Christa and took a deep breath before continuing. “Next moment… the car was in flames. My dad was yelling again and he managed to get out of the car first but… I was on fire. Just… there was fire everywhere.”

“My dad managed to wrestle me free but I don’t remember that. I don’t remember much after that, actually. Just waking up in hospital, being asked questions and being terrified that someone would find out what I did. I finished my rehab and couldn’t stay, so I ran. I took the biggest backpack I could find in the house, put some clothes, my dad’s combat knife and all the money I had saved up from birthdays and holidays and from work in it and ran. I rationed what I could but I ran out of money after a few months. No one wants to hire a homeless kid who can barely read or follow instructions so I had to pickpocket and steal to eat. Soup kitchens and those religious charity places are pretty awesome too.”

All of them sat in silence for a while as they digested Ymir’s story. “I would never have guessed that you took issue with your powers.” Petra spoke up after a while.

Ymir shrugged and speared a piece of food on her fork. “I got over it. And I know what you’re going to say next.”

“What?”

“That if I can get over my fear of using my powers then I can do the same thing for the car thing too.”

“Not exactly, but you are right.”

The sound of feet scuffling over the floor made everyone turn around. Hanji emerged around the corner, so tightly wrapped in two blankets that they could barely shuffle forward. Seeing them gathered at the table, Hanji simply nodded in acknowledgement.

“Food.”

Petra nodded in understanding and gestured towards the fridge. “There’s still some chicken and rice left over from last night. And some potatoes in the pan that haven’t been eaten yet.  It just needs to be heated up.”

Hanji nodded and shuffled over to the fridge and pulled out the containers. “Please, don’t stop on my account.”

Mikasa nodded and turned her attention back to the group seated at the table. “Okay, so, as I was saying, whoever wants a vehicle just tell me tomorrow and I’ll see what I can do.”

“That sounds good. Anyone else have anything they want to bring up?”

“I need to adjust some stuff on your suits and we need to sort out the not being able to give CPR properly issue,” Zara piped up, “But apart from those, I really thought that for our first time in the field, we all work together really well already.”

Everyone around the table made noises of agreement and Rico smiled. “It’s only going to get better from here, guys. We’re going to have a meeting when Hanji is feeling better so we’ll just rehash what we’ve just talked about and if you have anything you want to say or ask, think of it beforehand and we can have a discussion about them. Mikasa and Zara, you can inform us of any updates about the vehicles or suits then too. Any questions?”

At everyone’s head shakes, she clapped her hands together. “Good! So that’s done. Feel free to continue eating or head off now.”

The benches scraped along the floor as people pushed them away from the tables, grabbing their plates and heading back into the kitchen. Christa stayed and turned to face Ymir, straddling the bench.

“Have you done your readings today?”

Ymir snapped out of her thoughts and dropped her fork. “Huh? Oh, I did an hour while you were doing your exercise things and I was gonna do another hour before bed.”

“Want me to join you later?”

“Yeah, that’ll be nice.”

**TWO HOURS LATER**

“If you get pink highlighter on the sheets, I’ll punch you.”

Ymir eyed the sheets that she were currently sitting on. “Babe, the sheets are _pink leopard print_. How much of it will even show?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“Why do I even like you again?”

“Because I’m amazing, that’s why.”

“Always so modest. Hold on, I’m missing that chart thing.”

Leaning over Christa, Ymir yanked an open blue folder out from under a pillow and set it on her lap. “Alright, now where did I stop this morning?”

Quickly flicking a few pages over, she found the bright yellow post it note that indicated the sentence she had gotten up to.

_Two women lived in a house in the middle of the street. One of the women initially worked in logistics and distribution. The other woman was a teacher, who was fluent in a variety of languages._

“I can recognise most of these words.”

“That’s good!” Christa praised, leaning up to kiss her girlfriend’s cheek.

Ymir’s lips quirked upwards at the praise and began to highlight the words in different colours: green for the ones she recognised immediately, yellow for the ones she needed to break down into syllables and pink for the words she would need to take two letters at a time. Scanning the colored words, Ymir took a breath and began to read.

“Two women lived in a house in the middle of the street. One of the women--” Ymir stopped and frowned at the next pink word. Seeing this, Christa rummaged through a small case and handed her girlfriend a pencil. Ymir took it and broke the word up into parts, pausing a moment before rubbing out two lines to change the location of the breaks.

In / i / ti / al / ly.

“In-i-” Pausing, Ymir’s frown increased as she attempted to pronounce the sound, determined not to use the phonics chart unless she absolutely could not get it. “Sh?”

Christa smiled widely and bumped the top of her head against the bottom of Ymir’s chin. “That’s right!”

“In-i-sh-al-ly.” Ymir repeated this broken word several times.

“Initially.”

At Christa’s nod, Ymir continued on. “One of the women initially worked in--” Ymir broke up the word again and squinted at it.

“Lo-g-is-ti-c-s.” Immediately spotting her mistake, the freckled woman glanced over at the chart open on her lap before snapping it shut. “Lo-ji-s-ti-c-s? That sounds better.”

“It’s right.” Christa confirmed, bringing a hand up to stifle a yawn.

Repeating this process for the rest of the sentence, Ymir finally managed to read the entire two sentences fluently.

“Aren’t you still tired from yesterday?”

“A little.”

Tightening the arm that was slung around her girlfriend’s shoulders a little, Ymir leaned down to press her lips against Christa’s forehead. “Go to sleep, babe. I can go read in the living room.”

“I’m good until you finish. Besides, I don’t think I can sleep soundly just yet.”

“Because of the… death thing?”

“Yes. Because of that. And I still haven’t managed to talk to Annie about our talk. Something to worry about at another point.”

“Whatever you think’s best, babe.”

As Ymir read on, she absentmindedly stroked her fingers through Christa’s hair, smiling quietly as a low purr continuously rumbled from deep within Christa’s chest.

“Stop that,” the shapeshifter spoke up eventually, her voice laced with sleep, “you’re knocking me out.”

“Good.” Ymir murmured. “Go to sleep.”

“You almost done?”

“Just one more to go.”

By the time Ymir was done, Christa was dozing lightly against her chest. The pyrokinetic grit her teeth and tried to move all the reading materials off the bed without disturbing her girlfriend’s slumber, but Christa jerked awake at the sound of the folders hitting the floor.

“Shit, sorry. Go back to sleep.”

“I need to pee now.”

Quickly climbing out of bed, Christa quickly dashed off to the bathroom and returned just as Ymir had finished getting comfortable. With a soft groan, the blonde flopped ungracefully back onto her girlfriend.

Ymir grunted and tapped Christa’s forehead. “A little more gently next time? I’m not a solid wall like Mikasa.”

“Your stomach muscles say differently.”

Ymir grinned slightly and poked at her firm abdomen. “It _is_ pretty great. Did you do a hard exercise this morning? You’re usually good for another two hours.”

“Yeah.” Christa replied quietly. Ymir immediately picked up on the change in her tone and tightened the arm around her girlfriend’s shoulders.

“Still not getting as much as you hope?”

Christa nodded. “It’s just so frustrating, you know? I’m literally swimming in my own memories but I can only get three or four little pieces every single time.”

“Is Hanji holding you back deliberately?”

“No, I asked them. They said that they only restrained me enough so that something bad didn’t happen. This is all on me, apparently.”

“Do they know why?”

“Hanji says that some part of my brain might be deliberately holding me back to avoid any traumatic memories. Or that I’m subconsciously scared of what I might find.”

“Are you?”

“The only things I know about my parents is that my mother left and my sister doesn’t know where she is, and that my dad didn’t exactly take care of me. I do want to remember everything but I’m starting to wonder if that’s a good idea.”

“So you’re scared of finding out too much.”

Christa was silent for a minute. “Yes.”

“Okay, well, you already know where you were born and where you lived before you turned and a bunch of other stuff.” Ymir pondered. “What else do you want to know about that particular section of your life?”

“My name. I want to know what my birth name is, and my dad’s name so I know who he is.”

“Is that really all you have left to remember?”

“Yes.”

“Didn’t you say that if you focused on something particularly hard, you’d end up remembering that?”

“Yeah, it’s tiring but I’m getting better at it.”

“There you go. You’ve got a clear goal now, and you can stop when you have them.”

“That sounds good. I’ll do that.” Christa leaned up to kiss her girlfriend. “I spent days agonising over this and it’s all sorted after one conversation with you.”

“It’s because I’m the shit, babe.” Ymir grinned and Christa snorted playfully.  “Seriously though, you know that you can talk to me about everything. Like I know I’m an asshole most of the time but hey, I love you a lot and I just wanna make sure you’re okay.”

“Wow, is that a soft heart underneath that asshole exterior?”

“Don’t tell Annie.”

Christa laughed. “Your secret is safe with me.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 0909 HOURS, 14 DECEMBER 2011**

It took Mikasa’s fingers four days to almost heal completely. Of course, Rico helped significantly but her own durability was constantly still a surprise even after these long months of training and preparation. Clenching her hand a few more times and finding that the action generated a barely significant amount of pain, she finished the inspection on her fingers and trudged over to the benches, sitting down heavily next to Annie. The blonde was still uncharacteristically energetic, with both her legs bouncing at a rapid pace and her unoccupied hand constantly tapping on the wooden table top.

“Still going?”

Annie nodded rapidly and swallowed her mouthful of toast before replying. “Yep, I still can’t wind down.

“You must have absorbed a lot of electricity.”

“Apparently I took too much. I’ve slept barely six hours in the past three days and I don’t even feel tired.”

“Surely this can’t be good for you.”

“Probably not, but there’s not much I can do other than keep working to burn it all out. I’m getting there though.”

“Well, I was going to eat this then go out for a run. You could join me if you want.”

Annie leapt up from her seat, empty plate already in hand. “I would love that.”

**THREE HOURS LATER**

Panting heavily, Annie all but collapsed onto the park bench, her chest heaving as she gulped down air. “When you said ‘a run’, I had no idea you meant that you were going for a marathon.”

Mikasa, who was still infuriatingly unbothered by their thirty kilometer run, jogged on the spot lightly and looked highly amused at the exhaustion displayed clearly by her jogging partner’s body. “We’ve still got twelve to go. And I have enhanced condition, so this is still just a nice jog. What were you expecting?”

“I may have neglected to remember that during my electricity high. Now that I’ve burnt off most of it, I can safely say that I’m never going for a long run with you ever again.”

Mikasa laughed openly and stopped to take a seat next to Annie. “Do I need to carry you back?”

“God, no.”

“Rico seemed to keep up just fine.”

“Rico had three fingers blown off the other day and they grew new ones in less than half an hour, so they don’t count.” Annie wheezed out, bending over to alleviate the tightness in her chest. Mikasa patted her back sympathetically and they both fell silent.

“This place looks different during the day. I didn’t even notice the fountain the first time.” Mikasa observed after a while, gesturing towards the centre of the park. It was only then when Annie realised exactly which park they had stumbled into.

“To be fair, it was two in the morning the last time we were here.” Annie leaned back against the bench. “The reason why we were here the last time seemed so trivial.”

“Well, you did just find out you had a sister you never knew about. That’s not something everyone does everyday.”

“That ended up not being a bad thing at all.”

“How are you two? You two look like you’re getting along quite well now.”

“Better than I originally predicted.”

“Told you.”

“Oh shush.” Annie fell silent for a while, staring at her feet as they drew shapes in the dirt. “Deep down I honestly did think that she was just going end up being exactly like the rest of my family but she’s the exact opposite. It’s nice to be proven wrong this time.”

“That is a very good thing. And you and Ymir aren’t at each others throats anymore.” A pause. “Well. Not seriously anyway.”

Annie laughed at this. “Ymir’s a good person, under that prickly exterior. I respect her a lot. I have her back and I know she has mine, but it’s just fun to poke her. And she treats my sister well.”

“I’m glad to hear that. Pretty sure Christa was ready to jump between you two for a week or two after we found out about it all just in case you two started going at each other.”

That drew a small chuckle out of both of them. “Yeah,” Annie chortled, “she really did.”

The laughter trailed off into a comfortable silence as Annie continued to catch her breath.

“Speaking of thing that we talked about the last time we were here…” Mikasa’s voice was quiet, and Annie knew exactly what she was referring to. “It was a house fire.”

Annie didn’t respond and let her companion continue, fully aware that this was a topic that Mikasa didn’t share with anyone.

“I never found out how it started. All I know was that it was in the kitchen in the dead of night and that the smoke alarms didn’t go off. The only thing I remember is being dragged out of my room by a firefighter, screaming for my parents and yanking the scarf from the coat stand next to the doorway.”

“The red scarf you always wear?”

“Yes.” Mikasa’s hand subconsciously came up to fiddle with the scarf before realising she wasn’t wearing it. “It was my mother’s.”

“Apparently my dad died first; he never made it out of the house. My mother died later in hospital while I was still unconscious. Of course, I was put into the foster system and thankfully it wasn’t long until I was adopted.” Mikasa’s voice softened. “The Jaegers were very good to me.”

She paused for a moment, clenching her fists together momentarily before relaxing and drawing in a deeper breath. “And then my adoptive father left. Just up and vanished one day. We never found him and I still don’t know what happened to him.”

“Did your foster mum take that well?”

“No, she didn’t. She got severely depressed and I basically had to provide for the family. And then she developed early onset Alzheimer’s - it’s genetic in the Jaeger family, and Eren’s forgetful enough as is - and needed to be placed in a home. By then, I was old enough so that my brother and I could survive on our own. So we did. He stayed in school, I dropped out and took every single job that would take me.” Mikasa snorted lightly. “Social support doesn’t help a lot. I was a trash collector, an usher, a cashier and a waitress at the same time at one point. Used that money to get food in my brother’s stomach and to pay for all the education I needed to become a mechanic.”

“And that’s how you joined a gang.”

“Well, my brother’s the one responsible for that really. But if they weren’t impressed by what I could do with cars, I doubt they would have taken me.”

“Do you ever regret it?”

“Being in a gang?” Mikasa tilted her head upwards and closed her eyes. “Yes and no. I’m not proud of some of the things I’ve had to do when I was still with the Brawlers. And I’ve seen and done stuff that I can never, ever forget. But it certainly paid a lot better and that’s all that mattered then. Plus, there was no shortage of company. Friendly or otherwise.”

“Or otherwise?”

“You become a popular choice if you’re almost always undefeated during brawls or street races, and are one of the big boss’s most trusted mechanics. The guys learnt quickly that their answer was always going to be a no.”

“Some guys probably weren’t too happy about that.”

“No, they weren’t. But once they know how hard you can hit and that you’re basically in the boss’s back pocket, they tend to leave you alone.”

Annie laughed quietly at this and they descended into silence once again.

“How’s your mother?” The blonde eventually asked in a quieter voice.

“She’s well, all things considered.” Mikasa began to pick at her nails nervously. “She’s still in a nursing home. All the money I had went to Eren when I faked my death so I don’t have to worry about giving him money to pay for her fees for a while. Unless he goes and spends it all in one go.”

“Would he?”

“No, he may be impulsive and sometimes can make _really_ bad decisions, but not about this. He knows his mother doesn’t have long to live.” A heavy pause. “I’d like to visit her sometimes but it’s too risky going back there now.”

Annie laid a hand on Mikasa’s knee. “I’m sure between Hanji, Zara and Rico, they can all figure something out.”

Feeling Mikasa growing uncomfortable, the blonde hastily changed the topic. “Where’s your brother now?”

“He’s in Albany, training to be a cop.” Another pause. “Actually, he should have graduated by now.”

“Does he know you’re still alive?”

“Yes. I used the one call that Zara allowed to contact him.”

“He’s the only person on the outside that knows?”

“Well, he may have told his best friend, but I’m not worried about that. Eren and Armin know what will happen if the gang found out so they’re not about to go shouting it off rooftops.”

Annie nodded, understanding how much Mikasa trusted her to tell Annie her life story. “Thank you for sharing that with me. And… I’m sorry you had to go through all that.”

Mikasa shrugged. “Nothing I can do to change that now. And it doesn’t make up for everything but in retrospect, I think I’m even the tiniest bit glad that it did happen.”

“How so?”

“I wouldn’t be here if they didn’t happen.”

Annie closed her eyes and tilted her face up to the sun. “Guess everything worked out in the end, huh?”

Mikasa glanced sideways at her companion and smiled gently. “It’s definitely getting there.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, NEW YORK CITY, 1319 HOURS, 28TH DECEMBER 2011**

“You said you had something for me?”

Zara jumped at the sound of Hanji’s voice and turned around to face the scientist. “I didn’t even call you yet!”

Hanji shrugged. “I’m still not fully in control yet, so some things slip through. I apologise.”

“No worried. Saves me the effort of telling you actually. I assume you already know?”

“You have found possible matches?”

“I’ve got two. They were tagged an hour ago for more stringent observation. If either of them shows even a hint of power usage, they’ll take them.” A few clicks later, Zara brought up two dossier styled documents and dragged them to sit side by side on a large screen.

Hanji frowned. “One person has super speed, and the other can manipulate water. Not really the kind of powers that cause too much harm.”

Zara shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe their reasoning is that the one with super speed would be an excellent thief, but we can’t know for sure. All we know is that she’s been tagged and will very possibly be taken.”

Hanji looked back up at the large screen, taking in the twinkling brown eyes and carefree expression on both faces.

“In theory, water manipulation could be lethal because if they are powerful enough, they could suck the water right out of you. You’d be completely dehydrated in an instant. Either way, we can’t let them be taken. And super speed and water manipulation could come in very handy for us.”

Zara nodded in agreement. “Shall I get Petra to make contact?”

“Yes. She’ll also know very soon if she saw these people are in her vision too.” Hanji confirmed. Zara reached over to grab her phone but was stopped.

“No need, I’ve already asked her to come down here.”

“Telepathy is so handy sometimes.”

Not two minutes later, Petra entered the room, looking slightly disgruntled.

“What’s with you?”

“Annie just beat me in Mortal Kombat.” Petra grumbled. “She used Sub-Zero’s spine rip finishing move too.”

“I apologise if I distracted you from the game.”

Petra shook her head and smiled. “It’s alright, this is much more important. I’ll just kick her ass again later. Now, what did you call me down here for?”

Zara gestured up at the two files still on display on the screens. “These two were tagged this morning and we’re going to ask them to join. And since you’re probably the least intimidating at first glance out of all of us, we were wondering if you would be able to establish initial contact?”

“I’m assuming we’re not using masks or altering my voice?”

“No, it’s best we’re straight up honest about it to show that we’re not looking to harm them.”

Petra nodded and turned her attention back to the screens, studying the two faces for a few moments. “The water manipulator and the speedster. I remember them.”

“So you’ll handle this?”

“Yes, I can do this.”

“Which one do you want to go for first?”

“Well first of all, I’ll write up a little script for myself. I’ll call Sasha first, then Mina.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tfw you find a flaw in the whole masked vigilante outfit thing over a year later after so many things are set in stone. not being able to give mouth to mouth like goddamn
> 
> we apologise for the massive delay in this chapter, we just had a HUGE writers block and in the time it took us to write this we: completed da3, became unable to play da3, completed a whole lot of other games, sobbed at korrasami being canonised and nearly gouged our eyes out after staring at this chapter for so long oh my god we are SO relieved that this is out in the world rn


	9. A Place in the Clouds, A Foundation of Stone

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (strolls in many months late with starbucks and a fic you thought dead dragged behind) what's up y'all

**MALIBU, CALIFORNIA, 1734 HOURS, 29 DECEMBER 2011**

Thursdays had always been Mina’s favourite day of the week. Normally, school ended early, which meant that she was free to hop on a bus and make her way to one of the many beaches in Los Angeles. The fact that she was on holidays certainly didn’t change this particular part of her routine. As a person who could manipulate water with her mind, the ocean was like a second home to Mina.

The sun had finally began to make its descent from the sky, signalling to her that she should be getting home, lest she miss dinner. She was walking back to the bus stop and towelling her hair dry when her phone rang.

“Ah, crap.” Hastily flinging her wet towel over her shoulder, Mina pulled out her phone from her damp pocket and rolled her eyes when she saw the caller ID.

Accepting the call, she pressed the phone to her ear. “Ma, I’m coming home soon, okay? Don’t wo--”

“ _Anak_ ,” Her mother’s worried voice filtered through the earpiece of her phone, “Some strange men just came to the house while you were out. I told them that you were out and won’t be back for a few days. They’ve gone for now but they could be back.”

The water manipulator slowed her pace and ducked into a small alleyway. “What do they want?”

“I think they know about what you can do and at best, they’re here to just talk and at worst, they’re...  here to take you away.”

Mina’s heart stopped and her knees almost gave way. “But-- they can’t! I haven’t done anything wrong!”

“Mina, listen to me.” Her mother urged shakily. “You need to stay away from home for now. I’ve called Marcus and he’s ready to pick you up and take you to his house. He is confused but I’ve told him that it will be safer if he didn’t know what is going on. You have to hide there for now.”

“That’s not a solution, ma!” Mina’s hands started to shake and her stomach roiled in her gut. “They’re going to find me anyway and who knows what’s going to--”

“You need to call that person who told us that you had been tagged for suspicion.”

This made Mina pause. “What? I thought you and papa didn’t like her.”

“What choice do you have now? If that person is telling the truth, then they can hide you, train you, and you can do something good with those gifts that you have. Isn’t that what you wanted?”

Mina did. The person who had contacted her, a woman named Petra who had kind amber eyes and honest features, had offered her a place in a group of gifted individuals who had the power to make a difference in the way people with powers were viewed and treated. She had offered training, a new purpose in life with the powers that she had. Everything the woman promised matched exactly what Mina had been dreaming of doing ever since she discovered her talents with water several long years ago.

“Weren’t you and papa afraid that she was lying and simply setting me up to be caught?”

“You cannot run away on your own and there is not much else you can do apart from giving that woman a go. I know that you want this very badly, and your father and I know you well enough to know that we cannot stop you from doing something that you think is what you were born to do. You were given a beautiful gift, Mina. It’s time you used it properly.”

Mina was speechless. "Are you and papa giving me your permission?”

Her mother made a slightly incredulous sound. “Darling, you were going to join them sooner or later with or without our approval.” As much as Mina wanted to protest, she knew that it was true.

“Marcus is waiting for me to call?”

“Yes, your brother is unsure of which beach you are at so just call him, tell him and as soon as you are inside his house, _call the woman and accept her offer_.”

Mina clutched her phone tighter when she heard the doorbell ring from the other end of the line. “I love you, ma.”

“I love you more, my darling. Go now. Your father and I will call you again later.” With that, her mother hung up and Mina was left clutching her phone in a vice grip. Quickly shaking herself out of her daze, she scrolled through her contacts and called her brother. He picked up before the first ring even finished.

“Oh thank every single deity, you finally called! Where the hell are you?”  The relief in Marcus’s voice was painfully evident and Mina poked her head out of the alleyway to gather her surroundings.

“I’m at Dume Point beach.”

“Way to pick a beach that far away.”

“Less crowds on weekdays, alright? Remember that ice-cream shop that Rob used to take us near here?”

“Meet you there?”

“Yes please.”

Mina heard the sounds of keys jangling together and a door opening and closing as Marcus hurried to his car. “Stay out of sight until you see my car, okay? I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

Mina nodded. “I will. Love you, _kuya_.”

“Love you too, little sis. Don’t go anywhere.” With that, Marcus disconnected the call and Mina slid down the alleyway wall and hugged her knees.

“Frick.”

**PHOENIX, ARIZONA, 2001 HOURS, 29 DECEMBER 2011**

Her phone was ringing again.

It had been ringing non stop every few minutes for the past twenty minutes now, and it was an unknown number too. Considering recent events, she didn’t exactly want to answer it.

Shifting on her childhood bed, she grabbed her phone and rejected the call again. If it weren’t for the fact that she was waiting for a call from her mother, she would have turned the damn thing off a long time ago. She threw the phone onto the other end of the bed and it started to ring again.

“Fucking--” Sasha angrily grabbed the offending object and accepted the call. “Look friend, I would really appreciate it if you could st--”

“I apologise if this is not a good time but I know you have been outed, and I’m simply here to tell you that you are in danger and to make you an offer.”

“You must have the wrong number, because I have no idea what you’re talking about. Now would you please stop calling me?”

The person on the other end of the line huffed in exasperation. “Your name is Sasha Braus, and you are twenty one years old. You are currently attending cooking school in New York City but was born in Phoenix. You also have super speed, which is why you are currently being monitored.”

Sasha was at a loss for words. “Who are you?” She asked slowly, having no idea how to react to this strange caller.

“Have you heard about the bridge disaster in New York?”

“Of course. It’s all the news talked about for a week. Pretty hard to forget.”

“So you know about the band of superpowered people who helped evacuation and stabilisation?”

“Yeah of course, but what does that ha--” Sasha clicked her tongue. “You’re one of them, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

Sasha could hardly believe her ears. “How do I know you’re not lying?”

Her phone beeped, the icon for a video call flashing incessantly. “My name is Zara Smith. Accept this call and I’ll tell you everything.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, 1402 HOURS, 30 DECEMBER 2011**

“How are you holding up?”

Christa glanced up at her sister over the rim of her mug and shrugged. “Better.”

“I’m glad.” Annie offered. Christa nodded listlessly and returned to staring at the burn mark on the surface of the table, leaving Annie standing awkwardly across from her. “Well, we might as well get this over with. Rip it off like a bandaid and all.”

At this, Christa set her drink back down and pointedly looked at her sister. "Not in the mood right now." She said, her tone unusually clipped.

Annie had never been the best at dealing with emotions, especially not other people's. But this was her sister. They had only known each other for a short time, though it felt like much longer, and now this _disagreement_ hung over their heads like a dark cloud ready to cause a storm. Ignoring how ridiculously uncomfortable she felt, Annie sat across from her sister and tried again. “You’ve been blowing me off for two weeks now. The bridge was a spontaneous decision and something like that can happen at any time.  If we’re going to trusting each other in situations like that again, and there will be, we going to need to work this out as soon as possible.”

Christa closed her eyes and huffed quietly, but didn’t reply. Annie decided to approach this as gently as possible. Well, as gently as she could.

“Look, you did the best you could.”

Christa opened her eyes and turned to stare at her. “Are you completely ignoring what I said? _Later_.”

“It _is_ later. You can’t keep putting this off because it needs to be talked about, Christa. It's one life.” Annie was careful to keep her tone even. “ _One_ , compared to the many dozens we saved. You couldn't have done better than you did.”

Christa stood abruptly. “So he didn’t matter? His family, his friends, none of that matter?”

Annie had to fight that glare that tried to form. “Did I say that?”

“I could have saved him.” Christa’s voice breaks, but she continues. “I could have done more.”

“And what about those other people you saved? Don't _they_ matter? For fucks sake, Christa. No, you couldn't save him, but maybe he wouldn't have survived anyway. You didn't even have a chance to do CPR properly. Maybe if you'd been working on him you wouldn't have been able to help all those other people.”

“So you’re saying,” Christa interrupted, “That between a throng of people attempting to run to safety, and a person trapped under a car that was leaking gas, and was being fired at, you wouldn’t even try to save the person under the car?”

“Yes.” Annie answered immediately.

“Why?”

“Like you said, they’re pinned down under a heavy object that’s leaking a combustible fluid, while being shot at. I’m not risking my life or the lives of the other people running to safety for one person, who may not even make it.”

“So what, it’s a sacrifice you’re willing to make?”

“A necessary one.”

“Every life is important!”

“I am well aware of that.”

“Our job is to help people, to save them.” Christa’s pointer finger jabbed into the tabletop firmly.

“Look. We’re both right and wrong. Hell, depending on the situation, how we react can cause some serious collateral damage. But I know that while we can try, we can’t save everyone. I cannot prioritise one singular life over the lives of many.”

“It’s still better to try than to not try at all. Everyone deserves a chance.” Christa looked up, staring at her sister confidently. “This is my job, my calling, and I’ll be damned if I don’t try.”

Annie smiled sadly. “I know you will. I just hope it doesn’t get you killed one day.”

**PHOENIX, ARIZONA, 1222 HOURS, 3RD JANUARY 2012**

“Dad, no. I’ll be fine on my own!”

The frown on Sasha’s father’s face didn’t smooth out, but he laid a gentle hand over his daughter’s. “Are you sure? You don’t need me to go in with you?”

She shook her head. “I’ll be fine; it’s not like I haven’t done this before.”

“You don’t need help carrying your bags in?”

Sasha glanced back at the duffel bags in the back seat. “Dad, I have two bags. I can handle them on my own. Besides, I don’t need you to start crying at the terminal because then you’ll make me cry, which means you’ll be late for work and I will get a headache from crying. I have a four and a half hour flight and a headache won’t make that pleasant.”

“You do have a point.” He agreed as he abruptly slammed on the brakes to avoid colliding with a car that cut in front of him without indicating. Making an obscene gesture at the vehicle in front, he turned his attention back to his daughter. “I hope the traffic won’t get any worse. At this pace, you’ll probably turn up just in time to catch your plane.”

Sasha simply nodded at this, not trusting herself to say anything without blurting out where she was really going. Besides, her father didn’t know about her powers and spilling that she was about to get picked up by a bunch of superheroes to join a superhero group would probably give him another heart attack.

They ended up crawling at a snail’s pace to the front of the domestic terminal. Sasha exited the car when it stopped, pulling her bags onto her shoulders while her father rounded the back of the car to sweep her up in a hug. Sasha buried her face into her father’s broad shoulder and squeezed her eyes shut, wishing she could tell him what she was about to do so that he could tell her a corny joke and tell her that he believed in her. Instead, she gripped the back of his shirt tightly and let him pick her up off the ground slightly.

“I love you, darling. I know you don’t want to tell me what’s been bothering you but no matter what, you’re my daughter and I will always support you.” His voice was already quivering and she could tell that he was about to start crying. He let her down and she tightened her grip, not wanting to let go.

“Thanks dad. I love you too.”  

Her father sniffed and kissed her on the forehead before letting go. “You have to hurry or you’ll miss your plane.”

“Right.” Readjusting her bags, she gave her dad one last hug. “I’ll call when I get there.”

“Alright, have a safe flight.”

“I will. See you later!” Sasha called as her father climbed back into the driver’s seat and drove off. Just to be safe, she walked into the airport and waited a few minutes before pulling out her phone.

“ _I’m here. Where are you?_ ”  She typed quickly.

The reply came only seconds later. “ _Exit back out onto the main road. Parked in front of McDonald’s. Remember the quote._ ”

Sasha exited the building she was in and went to look around. “Not that far. Good.”

Setting off in a brisk pace, she strode through the carpark and down the road. It wasn’t long until she happened across the black Jeep, where a familiar looking woman was leaning against front of the car.

“Hi there!” Sasha called. “Know any good spots to go skiing here?” The woman’s head jerked up and smiled.

“Yes I do! In fact, we’re going to a few of those places now,  would you like to come with us?”

“I would love to!” She stuck out her hand for Petra to shake. “You haven’t been waiting here for very long, have you?”

Petra shook the proffered hand. “No, we haven’t. Might’ve had to wait a little longer if the traffic wasn’t so terrible.”

“I feel that. Barely got here on time myself.”

Both of them stood there for a few moments awkwardly. “Do you want any food before we start driving?” Petra asked, jerking her thumb behind her.

Sasha shook her head. “My mom made me the biggest breakfast I’ve ever had.” She explained, patting her stomach. “I’ll be good until tonight.”

“I’m sorry if this comes off as insensitive, but do your family know where you’re really heading off to?”

Sasha shook her head and looked at her feet. “No. They don’t know anything and it’s better if it’s that way.”

Petra nodded. “I understand.” The person in the driver’s seat rapped their knuckles on the window, signalling to get a move on and Petra took her bags off her shoulders. “Go ahead and climb in. We’ve got a six hour drive ahead of us.”

**SANTA MONICA, CALIFORNIA, 2009 HOURS, 3RD JANUARY 2012**

“Do you have everything you need?”

Mina rifled through the numerous bags that her parents had brought with them. “I got everything.” She zipped up all the bags and straightened up. “I guess this is it.”

Her stepfather looked uneasy and strode up to her, gently cupping her cheeks and looking at her with concern.

“Mina, are you absolutely sure that you want to do this?”

“Papa, even if I didn’t want to, which I do, I don’t have any other real options.”

“That’s true.” His jaw jumped in anxiety and he took a seat on the long couch, pulling his daughter down next to him. “There’s not much we can do now other than wait then.”

After five minutes of silence, her father checked the clock on the wall opposite them. “They’re late.”

“They’ll probably be here soon, don’t worry.” Her mother commented. She had barely finished her sentence before the buzzer to the apartment rang, and the three of them looked at each other before Mina’s father stood and pressed the button.

“Who is it?”

There was a brief pause. “Kate Kane.”

At that, he pressed the button to open the bottom gate. He opened the door at the three, short taps on the door and two women stepped into the apartment. Mina recognised one of them as Petra, but the other tall woman was unfamiliar.

No one spoke for a few moments as Mina and her parents studied the two newcomers. “Somehow, you’re just as intimidating when you’re out of the outfit, Valkyrie.”

Mikasa smiled slightly at this. “Not many people get to say that.”

“You weren’t followed?” Mina’s father asked, his voice tight.

“No one knows who we are and what we’re here for. If anything, we might be followed on the way out of the city but we have taken many steps to ensure that we won’t be.” Petra reassured. “Commander’s in the car for our cover and Oracle is back at base, looping and erasing appropriate security footage. No one will know that we were here or know that Mina left with us.”

“Are you sure you’ll be able to keep her safe?”

“We won’t let anything bad happen to her, Mrs. Carolina. We promise. She won’t be allowed to go out on duty alone until five different people assess her and agree that she can.”

Mr. Carolina’s hands on his daughter's shoulders tightened slightly and Mina’s mother let out a shaky breath.

“How will you be getting back to New York?”

“We’re driving.” Mikasa answered. “It’s not ideal for time but we’ll have to worry less about any security clearances and things like that.”

“When will we see her next?”

“Oracle’s working on creating a very secure channel where anyone can contact whoever they want without being monitored or tracked. She’s almost finished with it so as soon as we get to New York, you might be able to talk. Eventually we’ll have video too.”

Mina’s father still had a death grip on his daughter’s shoulders and sometime during the conversation, Mrs. Carolina had taken both of Mina’s hands in her own. Mikasa checked her watch. “I’m sorry to rush things, but we’re already running four minutes behind schedule because of the traffic. We really need to leave soon.”

“Time to go then.” Mina’s mother breathed out, her voice wavering.

Sensing that a tearful farewell was about to happen, Petra spoke up. “Actually, do you mind if we both use the bathroom? It was a long journey.”

“Sure. It’s just down that hallway, third door on the left.”

Both Mikasa and Petra exited quietly, shutting the sliding door in the hallway behind them. Mina’s father turned her around gently and pulled her into a tight hug. Mina hugged back just as tightly and buried her face in his shirt.

“I am so proud of you, my daughter. I will miss you so much.”

“I’ll miss you too, papa.” Mina replied tearfully. Mr. Carolina squeezed his eyes shut and hugged her for a few more seconds before letting her go. Mina wiped her eyes and fell into the arms of her already crying mother.

In the dim hallway, Petra averted her eyes from the scene and dialled a number on her phone. The person at the other end picked up immediately.

“Hanji, we’re just about ready. Come up after a minute and we’ll let you in.”

“On my way.” Hanji replied before disconnecting the call.

Re-entering the living room after actually going to the bathroom, the buzzer sounded once again and they let Hanji in. Hanji smiled awkwardly at Mina and her parents.

“Good evening. Are we ready to leave?”

“Yes. We’ll head down first and give you time to do what you need to do.” Mikasa replied, picking up all of Mina’s bags.

Hanji nodded, turning to Mina’s parents.

“What do you need to do?” Mr. Carolina asked.

“I need to erase your memories of our names and faces. You’ll remember where Mina is and everything that happened, you just won’t remember what we look like or anything like that. This is for the safety of all of us.”

Mina’s parents exchanged nervous looks but nodded. “We understand.”

Hanji smiled reassuringly. “It won’t hurt at all. The three of them will go outside first and I’ll just get you two to sit on the couch and close your eyes. I’ll erase what I need to and I ask you not to open your eyes again until you hear a car beep twice.”

Mr. and Mrs. Carolina nodded again, gripping their daughter’s hands tighter for a moment before letting go simultaneously. Mina moved from between them turned to face them.

“See you later then.”

Mina’s parents smiled tearfully. “We’ll see you soon.”

Petra placed a hand on Mina’s shoulder and guided her out of the apartment gently, very much aware of the fact that Hanji was practically screaming silently because they had little idea of how to tactfully deal with the intense emotions. Mikasa followed them out and Petra briefly heard Hanji stammer something out before the door shut behind her.

The three of them exited the building in silence and Petra opened a door to the car and motioned for Mina to climb in. Entering the car, she took care not to disturb the woman sleeping in the seat next to her. Petra climbed in next to her and Mina shot her a questioning look, gesturing at the sleeping figure.

“That’s Sasha. We picked her up on the way here.”

“Oh, the other new recruit.”

“Don’t worry, you’ll have plenty of time to get to know each other before we even get back to New York. We have over two days of driving to do.”

“Everyone settled in?” Hanji asked as they clambered into the front seat.

“All good to go.”

Mikasa honked the horn twice, and pulled out of the parking spot. Mina twisted around to watch the apartment get smaller and smaller until it was blocked from her view as they turned a corner. Sensing her emotional state, Petra covered Mina’s hand with her own and gave it a gentle squeeze. Mina gave Petra a watery smile and flicked her finger to evaporate her tears and the trails they left.

“You’ll see them again soon, I promise.”

**SOMEWHERE IN MISSOURI, 0650 HOURS, 5TH JANUARY 2012**

The smell of coffee saturated the car as four tired people and Mikasa set off on their third day of driving. Hanji was lightly dozing in the back up against a pile of luggage and Mina was already on her third coffee. Sasha had sagged against the window and was slipping in and out of sleep. Groaning, she sat upright again and shook her head.

“I told you to get some coffee.” Mina said.

Sasha pulled a face. “You haven’t seen me on coffee and I don’t think you want to. Trust me when I say that you should never ever give me coffee unless it’s a matter of life or death.”

Mina looked at her quizzically but decided against asking. “Is another game of I Spy about to be played?”

Sasha pursed her lips, looking thoughtful. “Actually, would you mind if I asked you something a little personal?”

Mina blinked groggily at her new friend. “That depends? But go ahead.”

“How did you find out about your powers?”

Lowering her coffee, she wrapped both hands around the cup with a contemplative expression on her face. “I have, well, had, a pool in the backyard and I remember it was on one late afternoon during summer break. I was the only one in the house and I was just sitting on the side pushing water around with my hands. I was doing it for a while and I zoned out for a bit but then I noticed that the waves I was making were a lot larger than they should have been. Lifted my hands out of the water and kept doing the same motion and bam, water was still moving even without me touching it.”

“Can you do a lot with it?”

“No, I don’t use it for anything other than holding my breath for a really long time and I try not to use it to swim faster during races because it’s not fair to other competitors. But it is fun to play around with sometimes.” She shrugged. “What about you?”

Sasha hesitated a little before answering. “I got a bit, uh, inebriated. Don’t remember what I was running for but I remember I went so fast.”

“So you got drunk and ran too fast.”

“Basically. Sobered up pretty much immediately once I realised what had happened.”

“How did the rest of you find out about your powers, if you don’t mind me asking?” Mina craned her neck over the back of the front seat to address Petra and Mikasa.

Petra stifled a yawn before she began to talk. “Mine happened for the first time when I was seven. I was being scolded by my dad for something I did and all of a sudden, I disappeared. I didn’t become visible again until I had calmed down. The first vision I ever had was a little after I first met Hanji, actually. In a room full of people too.”

“And how did your dad react?” Sasha asked.

“Surprisingly calm for someone who just watched his daughter disappear into thin air.”

Mikasa snorted quietly. “At least you didn’t get frustrated and punch your arm through a car hood. Didn’t have a single scratch on me afterwards. Couldn’t say the same for the car though; that was fun to explain to my boss and the customer.”

“How did you explain that?”

“I don’t even remember. Something about faulty equipment and exhaustion. Don’t think they were entirely convinced though but I made up for it.” Mikasa shrugged.

“How much can you actually lift right now?” Mina asked.

“Uh well, the freight engine I’m currently using is around one hundred and twenty tons but I’m getting used to it. Going to have to move onto something heavier soon.”

Both Sasha and Mina’s mouths fell open and Mikasa laughed loudly. “What about you, Hanji? If you’re awake?”

“Telepathy developed first.” The scientist mumbled, clearing their throat and sitting up before continuing. “Just some buzzing of thoughts to begin with then it steadily became louder until it was almost unbearable. The colours also became unbearable for a while too. My telekinesis developed when it became too loud at work and I subconsciously levitated half the contents of my lab before I could get it back under control.”

“Colours?” Mina frowned, twisting around to look at the scientist. “What do you mean colours?”

“Every person has a unique mind, therefore they sounds different, looks different, tastes different. Every mind has different colours.” Hanji tilted their head the side and squinted. “Yours, for example, is a sort of sea foam green. We’ve known each other for three days but your mind has never been still, even when you’ve been sleeping and I can feel your conviction that your powers are yours for a reason. That they were given to you so you could do good and that you’re now fulfilling a life purpose.”

Without stopping Hanji shifted to face Sasha and continued. “Yours is also endlessly active, a constant blur of the brightest colours that’s rarely ever dampened. It’s almost dizzying and filled with whirring thoughts and excitement and compassion but,” Hanji squeezed their eyes shut and concentrated harder, “There’s something else, something darker around the edges but I can’t name it.”

Sasha nodded slowly, contemplating Hanji’s words. Eventually she sighed. “Thanks Hanji but darn. That didn’t take nearly as long as I hoped it would.”

Mikasa laughed heartily. “We just passed a sign that said that there’s a diner in a mile or so. Want to stop and get some food?”

“Yes _please_.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, 1507 HOURS, 7TH JANUARY 2012**

“And here we are.”

Both Mina and Sasha had their faces practically pressed against the windows of the car as they drove into the base slowly, taking in as much of the exterior as possible.

“What did this place used to be?” Sasha asked as she spied the watchtower.

“It was a military base. We’ve repurposed it a little.”

“I want to ask how you managed to do that without anyone finding out but something tells me I would rather not know.”

Mikasa chuckled quietly as she drove into her garage and turned off the car. “You’re going to say that a lot.” Exiting the car, she stretched her arms above her head and yawned. Annie, who had just entered, used this moment of weakness to poke Mikasa in the side of the ribs. Mikasa let out a small squeak and Annie snorted amusingly.

“So dignified.” Turning to the others, Annie smiled lightly. “It’s good to see you all. The welcoming party would usually be a bit larger but I’m the only one here right now.”

“Where is everyone?” Hanji huffed out as they dragged one of Mina’s suitcases out of the boot of the car.

“They all went grocery shopping because apparently we forget how to take care of ourselves when the resident mother bear isn’t around and now we have two more people to feed.”

Mikasa snorted. “You guys actually forgot to go shopping because Petra wasn’t around?”

“More like we were too lazy to until Christa got fed up and basically herded everyone out the door and into a car.”

“Did they really all have to go?”

“Well we didn’t have Mikasa so they all had to go to carry all the stuff back. They should be back soon though, it’s been more than an hour already.”

“And why didn’t you go with them?” Sasha asked.

“Christa thought that at least one person should stay behind just in case you guys came back while they were away. Make sure you didn’t think that we had gotten kidnapped or something. And normally that person would be Zara but she and Ymir got into an argument over tortilla chips and suddenly she was hellbent on going.”

"Nothing got set on fire, right?" Petra asked worriedly.

“An empty chip packet was the only victim.”

Mina chuckled. “Does that usually happen often?” She asked, drawing Annie’s attention to her.

“Just don’t come between Zara and her cereal and you should be fine.” Annie replied.

Mina looked at Annie, head tilted to the side curiously. “What can you do?”

Annie brought her index fingers close together, letting a single line of white electricity arc between them. “You’re the water manipulator, right? We probably shouldn’t be that close to each other when we’re training or fighting.” A pause. “Unless mass electrocution is our intention, of course.”

Mina laughed and Annie broke the arc. “I hope we’ll never have to use that.”

Annie turned to Sasha next but before she could say anything, she was cut off by loud, obnoxious beeping. They all turned to the entrance of the garage to see Zara leaning over an irate Rico to press the car horn persistently. The car rolled to a stop next to them and in the back, Ymir breathed an audible sigh of relief.

“Carol motherfucking Danvers is back, thank fuck.” Exiting the car, she popped the trunk open. “Oi Ms. Marvel!” Ymir called. “There’s almost three hundred bucks worth of groceries that we all need to get into the kitchen here and we almost died getting it into the car so mind helping us out a little?”

Mikasa rolled her eyes. “Such babies.” She remarked before marching over to the car and proceeded to move all the groceries in one trip.

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, 1100 HOURS, 9TH JANUARY 2012**

“Right, so the aim of today is to ascertain the extent of your current abilities. We need to know this to see how you can improve and how we can help you do that.”

Standing among mountains of paper stacks in Hanji’s lab, Mina eyed the bucket of water at her feet almost warily. “Like I said, there’s not really much I can do right now.” She said shyly. Rico patted her shoulder reassuringly.

“Don’t worry about it, you have plenty of time to improve. All we ask is that you work hard, but know your limits so you don’t hurt yourself. Your safety is the most important part of this training, okay?”

Mina nodded, looking slightly less nervous and took a deep breath. “I understand. I won’t let you down.”

“I know you won’t.” Rico smiled. “What can you show us?”

At this question, Mina gestured towards the bucket of water and a globe of water the size of a small soccer ball rose out. The water shifted and expanded as it hung in the air and Mina began to move her hands, the water trailing after the motions. Both Hanji and Rico watched in awe as the water obeyed her every movement.

“Absolutely fascinating.” Hanji muttered under their breath and Mina blushed slightly.

“I can also make it like a whip.”

“How so?”

Focusing intently on the water, she snapped her hand to the side and the water followed it, knocking gently against Hanji’s clipboard.

“Oh! That’s good!” Hanji hurried over to a nearby table and swept a few things off its surface. Placing four plastic cups on the table, they spaced them out evenly and turned to face Mina.

“Try to knock these over.”

She looked at Rico dubiously, who nodded encouragingly at her. Mina squinted at the red cups for a few seconds before snapping her hand forward again. The whip of water shot forwards again but missed the first cup by a few centimeters to the left.

“That was a good attempt!” Rico said, grasping her gently by the shoulders and repositioning her slightly. ”Now try again.”

Mina focused on the task again and struck. This time, the water hit the first cup and sent it tumbling to the floor. Not losing her focus, Mina managed to knock over the remaining cups in no time at all.

Rico nodded approvingly. “That’s something that you can definitely use when fighting.”

“It’s the only thing I can really use right now though.”

Hanji scratched their chin as a potential suggestion came to them. “Have you ever watched Avatar?”

“The movie?”

“No, The Last Airbender. The television show.”

“Oh, that Avatar! It looked interesting from the few episodes that I watched with my older sister.”

“I think it might be a good idea to watch the entire series again, and mainly focus on watching the waterbenders and how they move, how they fight, things like that. It might give you an idea of what you could possibly do.”

Mina looked surprised at this suggestion. “I can do that.”

“It’s a good idea.” Rico chipped in, nodding. “The movements that all the people use are derived from some form of martial arts and that could also be used as a reference for how you could use your powers. Good idea, Hanji.”

“Alright!” The scientist clapped their hands together. “That’s all I wanted to do for today and you have your first instructions. You are free to go. Thank you!”

“Actually, one last thing before you leave.” Rico moved to stand a few pace in front of the table. “I want you to hit me that water whip.”

“What, why?”

“I want to know how hard the impact is. Might give me an idea of what kind of things to work on during training.”

“That is an excellent idea, Rico.”

“But what if I hurt you?” The water manipulator asked.

“Mina, I’ve had my thigh skinned down to the bone and it healed within the hour. I’ll be fine, trust me.”

She blanched slightly at Rico’s words but agreed. “Alright then. Are you ready?”

“Go ahead. Hit me as hard as you can.”

The water slapped against the skin of Rico’s arm with a loud smack and the healer flinched slightly. The area that the water came into contact with had started to go red almost immediately and Rico rubbed it absent mindedly.

“Not bad, not bad at all. Good for disarming and distractions, a little harder and you might be able to knock someone around quite well. Thank you for that.”

“No problem. Is that all?”

“Yep. And hey, you brought your computer didn’t you? If you go tell Zara that you’re supposed to watch Avatar for ideas, I’m sure she’ll let you borrow her biggest screen so you can watch it in a higher quality. Plus, her sound system is pretty damn sweet and she _loves_ the Avatar series.”

**THREE HOURS LATER**

“I hope you all remember what I taught you yesterday, because today's tests won’t be very useful if data isn’t collected properly.”

“Don’t worry,” Petra soothed, “We all went over this just yesterday.”

“For two hours.” Rico added, leaning against the side of Mikasa’s car.

“Oh right, that reminds me.” Mikasa climbed out of her car and walked around the back to open the trunk, pulling out two fire extinguishers.

“What are those for?”

Mikasa shrugged. “Just a precaution. Never know what might happen when super speed, testing and Hanji is involved.”

The words had barely left Mikasa’s mouth before Sasha came zipping in with a blur of colour. “Hi!” She called, bounding up to them and smiling widely.

“You’re here! Just in time too.” Looking down, they noticed Sasha’s lack of footwear. “Not wearing shoes?”

“They get ruined too quickly when I run, and I don’t have that many pairs of shoes.”

“Ah. And your bare feet can handle it?”

“Yep! I’m ready to go.” Sasha replied, bouncing on the balls of her feet rapidly.

“Okay!” Hanji clapped their hands together. “First test, Mikasa’s going to drive this car and she’s going to steadily accelerate. You simply need to try and keep up with her.”

Sasha nodded and moved to stand next to the car. “We’re going in laps?”

“Yes. I’ll start off slow at first then I’m going to accelerate to top speed on this car before slowing down again until we stop.”

“And what’s this test for?”

“Long story short, progression stuff. Don’t ask for the full explanation.” Rico said. “We’re ready when you are.”

Mikasa climbed back into the car and revved the engine. “I’m all good.”

Sasha gave the three of them a thumbs up. “Alright then, go!”

At this, the car rolled forwards slowly and Sasha set off beside it in a leisurely walk. Mikasa accelerated more until Sasha finally had to start up a slow jog to keep up before leaning out the window slightly.

“You ready to go faster?”

Sasha nodded and Mikasa applied more pressure onto the accelerator pedal, making the car speed up significantly. Eventually, Mikasa was going full speed and she skidded around a corner, Sasha still looking calm and not at all bothered by the speed. Hanji eventually waved at them to stop so Mikasa guided the car to come to a stop gently, Sasha still keeping pace the entire time. Sasha didn’t even look out of breath or remotely fazed.

“Any trouble keeping up?”

Sasha shook her head. “Nope! Don’t feel any different when I first started.”

Mikasa looked at her incredulously. “I was going top speed.”

“Felt like a mild jog, really.”

“I was going seventy four miles an hour, and that was a jog?”

“Pretty much. It was easy to keep up.”

“Not to worry, I thought this would happen and have prepared for such an eventuality! I have a… well, an assortment of equipment here.” Hanji said, spreading their arms out and gesturing a nearby table with a number of different handheld machines. “I have no idea how fast you actually are so I didn’t want to take any chances. Mikasa, Rico, Petra and I are going to stand in front of one of the four walls and for this test, I am simply asking you to run laps as fast as you can for as long as you can. Take as much time as you need to build up to that speed. Do you need to take a break before we proceed?”

“Nope! I feel fine.”

“Excellent! Let’s begin!” Hanji handed out the equipment and the four testers moved to stand in their designated positions. “Ready?”

Sasha nodded, shifting into position. “And go!” Hanji yelled.

Sasha took off instantly in a blur and the four testers barely had enough time to activate their respective machines. In the blink of an eye, Sasha had already accelerated past the top speed from the previous test and Hanji watched the little screen in utter amazement as the climbed higher and higher with each pass.

“480… 487… 492… 500…” Hanji counted aloud.

The test was over in the next few seconds. Sasha eventually glided to a stop and bent over, grasping her knees and gulping for air before falling backwards onto the floor.

Hanji collected the four machines and compared their data. “Your top speed was 502 kilometers per hour! That is simply incredible!”

Mikasa gave Hanji a blank look. “Translation please?”

“311.928 miles per hour. Sasha could run to the west coast at that speed in approximately six hours!” Hanji replied short seconds later. Mikasa made a face of understanding and then raised both eyebrows.

“That’s… really fast.”

Sasha weakly gave Hanji two thumbs up and laid back on the floor. “That’s great and all but someone might need to carry me back inside.”

“We’ll have to work on your endurance, that’s for sure.”

“You’re also going to have to make me a suit that doesn’t wear away every time I run.” Sasha added, gesturing down at her torn clothing.

“You don’t need to worry about that, we’ve got that covered.”

“How are you even going to do something like that?”

“We have a friend. Shouldn’t be too difficult for them.” Hanji said absent mindedly, already seated on a small stool and scribbling down the observations made in the experiments.

Sasha waved her hand around airily. “I’ll take your word for it then.”

“Ymir had her fireproof sword and suit altered by her. It’s really quite amazing.” Mikasa said, picking up Sasha bridal style. “To your room?”

“Yes please.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, 1848 HOURS, 10TH JANUARY 2012**

Ever since early in the morning, the delicious smells from the kitchen had wafted out into other areas of the base, making almost everyone congregate in the lounge room just to bask in the scent. Even Hanji had taken to sketching Sasha and Mina’s new suits there despite the noises coming from the TV and the two people playing video games.

The seat next to them dipped as Petra sat down. “New outfits?” She asked, peering over Hanji’s shoulder to look at the small sketchbook.

“Yes. Just some general ideas and thoughts about what kind of modifications they need, any attachments, things like that.”

Petra nodded. “That’s good! I have a question though.”

“Yes?”

“Did you eat breakfast or lunch today?”

Hanji froze. “Uh…”

“Because you didn't eat dinner last night either.”

“Oh, that’s why I’m so hungry!” Their expression turned guilt and they rubbed the back of their neck sheepishly. “I’m sorry. I got too caught up in something I was testing for Annie.”

Petra shook her head slightly. “It’s alright, at least now you remember. And considering the amount of groceries Sasha came back with this morning, I have a feeling that you’ll have more than enough food to make up for it tonight.”

“I wonder when she’ll be done.” Hanji wondered, putting their pencil down and stretching their arms over their head.

“I’ll go ask, was going to get some water anyway.”

Hanji nodded absent-mindedly, continuing to scribble notes into the margin of their notebook and Petra left them to it, kissing them on the forehead briefly before entering the kitchen.

Sasha’s hands and fingers were impossibly fast as they opened packet after packet of spaghetti in rapid succession. Three pots were bubbling away on the stove and Sasha flitted them between the three of them, adding things and tasting all of them in the span of a few seconds and she only stopped when she saw Petra watching her curiously.

“Oh, hi! I didn’t see you there!” Sasha beamed at Petra, wiping her hands on the dishcloth on her shoulder and took a swig of water.

“I have to say, you look very comfortable with your abilities.” Petra observed as she maneuvered around a stack of pans to fill a cup with water.

Sasha nodded. “I use it a lot in private. And sometimes in public.”

Quickly swallowing her mouthful of water, Petra put the glass down and leaned against the bench. “Speaking of your powers, I’ve been thinking about something ever since I watched you run yesterday. Do you mind if I asked you a question about them?”

Sasha turned quickly to shut off two stove tops and leaned against a countertop when she was done. “No, of course not! Go ahead.”

“How do you manage to process everything that is happening at such a great speed?”

“Well, everything kind of goes all slow mo when I run. Like, I’m still moving fast but everything around me is in slow motion. And I read on the internet that you can’t breathe at supersonic speeds but I can and I don’t get hurt by friction. And that also goes to whatever clothes I’m wearing, and that doesn’t make sense.” A pause. “Well, my clothes don’t usually burn up. Yesterday was probably because I was going so fast.”

Petra gestured around the kitchen. “And clearly your speed doesn’t only extend to running.”

Sasha shook her head. “My reaction time is real fast and I can move my arms, hands and fingers at the same speed too.” She gave a short laugh. “It’s how I got caught actually.”

Petra tilted her head to the side quizzically. “How _did_ you get caught?”

Sasha rubbed the back of her neck sheepishly. “It was stupid, really. We have to cook really quickly because there’s so much to do in so little time and I may or may not have used my powers just a fraction to cheat.”

“Your classmates picked up on that?”

“Yeah. I didn’t start off too fast, but then I got more confident and less careful and after a few months they just all came at me one time and confronted me about it. It was pretty intense and I ran.” She scoffed at herself. “Great decision me, running. Pretty much confirmed that I did have powers no matter how vehemently I denied having them. But I thought it was just going to be an argument but nope, somehow the cops got involved and well,” Sasha waved her spoon around, “Now I’m here.”

“Is that a good or a bad thing? Honestly.”

“Both? I mean, I always wanted to go to cooking school - and those few short months were amazing - and be a chef like so many people in my family but I know that’s not an option anymore.” She said with a hint of sadness. “But now at least I can make sure y’all are fed well and properly, and kick some criminal ass at the same time.”

“If all the food you’ve made in a few hours and how good everything smells is any indication, we’re going to be taken care of really well.”

Sasha smiled bashfully for a moment before her face scrunched up. “I’m sorry, I must’ve distracted you from whatever you came in here to do.”

“No, you didn’t! Just wanted some water. And Hanji hasn’t eaten since yesterday afternoon and I was just wondering when dinner would be ready.”

“Not long, and I’ve got the perfect thing.”

Sasha dipped a teaspoon into the steaming pot and scooped out a bit of sauce. “Hanji mentioned that they missed eating spaghetti but doesn’t know how to cook it properly. Here, try this.”

Petra accepted the spoon from Sasha and blew on the sauce gently before tasting it. “Oh my God.”

Sasha’s face split into a wide grin. “Good?”

“This is amazing!” Petra eyed the pot of sauce with anticipation. “When’s it ready?”

“Already is! This was the last thing that I needed to cook and I kind of went a little overboard with this entire meal. I just need to cook the actual pasta now and that won’t take too long. I should probably go call everyone now actually.”

“At this rate, you’ll even get Zara up here more often to eat. You really won her over with that batch of cupcakes you baked yesterday.”

Sasha laughed nervously. “I just really hope that you guys like everything.”

“Oh don’t worry,” Petra reassured, “If it tastes as good as it smells, all this will probably be gone in around half an hour.”

**TWENTY FIVE MINUTES LATER**

“Oh my fucking God,” Ymir groaned, leaning back against the back of the chair and resting a hand on her bulging stomach. “I can’t move.”

“Is no one else going to eat this curry?” Rico gestured at the almost empty pot of green curry. “Because I’m about to inhale it so if you want some, get it now.”

Mikasa, who was slouched over the table, raised her hand. “I really shouldn’t but I can’t stop myself."

Sasha flushed with happiness as she surveyed the empty pots and the dishes that had been scraped and licked clean. “I’m sort of glad that I didn’t make dessert now.”

“If you did, I would have turned into a hummingbird or something to digest everything quickly so I could eat more.” Christa groaned. Taking advantage of Ymir’s posture, she swivelled around and laid her head on Ymir’s lap. “This is not a better position.”

“I was also planning to make a nice lunch for you all tomorrow.”

“Oh that’s an incentive to get up early and do a workout for hours.” Annie got to her feet unsteadily and shuffled into the kitchen to refill her drink.

“What are you making?” Hanji asked, still telekinetically attempting to remove all the spaghetti sauce from the pot.

“Well,” Sasha began, “I was thinking pan-seared lamb chops coated in a toasted breadcrumb salsa--”

She was cut off by Ymir’s loud groan. “Christa, get off me. I’m going to start working out right now so I can eat lunch tomorrow.”

“I’ll join you.” Mina piped up.

Finally putting the pot down, Hanji groaned and stretched. “Sasha, I would really like to take a few measurements down before you go to bed. When would be the best time?”

“Oh, well I was going to wash up then take a shower first--”

“Go take your shower, we’ll all wash up.” Zara interrupted.

Sasha looked like she was going to protest, but the hacker cut her off with a wave of her hand. “Ah ah! You cooked us all an amazing meal. You’re banned from washing up.”

“But--”

“Uh uh!” Zara sang, taking the dirty dishes from Sasha’s hands.

Rico shrugged, still digging into the last of their food. “I’d just listen to what she says.”

**FOUR HOURS LATER**

“Glad you’re not still curled in the fetal position.” Sasha joked when she entered the living room.

“God, me too.” Mina smiled and shifted on the sofa. “Still really full though, but I seriously didn’t want to stop eating. Probably won’t need to eat again until late afternoon tomorrow.”

“I’m really glad you all enjoyed it!” Mina smiled and noticed that Sasha was twisting her fingers together rapidly, like there was something that she wanted to say but wasn’t quite sure how to proceed.

“What’s up?”

Sasha looked sheepish and sat down also hesitantly next to Mina. “I swear I wasn’t trying to eavesdrop but I um, heard you crying for a long time last night.”

Mina immediately stiffened and brought her knees up to her chest to hug them. “Oh.”

“How have you really been holding up?” Sasha asked delicately. “The last few days have been crazy.”

Mina sighed tremulously and began to pick at a loose thread on the edge of the blanket. “To be honest? Not really all that great.”

Sasha clicked her tongue sympathetically and put an arm around her friend’s shoulders. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“I miss everything.” Mina started after a moment’s pause. “I miss my parents, my brothers and sisters, my friends, my cousins, my grandparents, my house, everything.” Mina closed her eyes and a few tears leaked out. “I even miss my neighbour’s bad singing at seven o’clock in the morning and the woman who rides by our house with the really squeaky bike three times a day.”

Sasha didn’t really know how to respond other than rubbing circles over Mina’s upper arm and pulling her closer. “I’m sorry.”

She wiped her eyes and sniffed. “I mean, this is stupid. You look like you’re handling it fine.”

Sasha shook her head. “But I’m different. I had already moved out and to another state for more than half a year before all this. I’m also older and moving back to a place where I was already staying. You, on the other hand, have uprooted your entire life and moved to the other side of the country with people you barely know and will be put into situations that are even stranger. Feeling homesick is kind of expected, really.”

Mina sniffled again but didn’t say anything, so Sasha continued to talk. “Y’know, I really didn’t deal with it well after I first moved too.”

“How did you handle it?”

“Well for me, I found that making a routine worked pretty well. Tried to do things that I did back at home and made sure I set aside some time during the day or week to do it.”

“What kind of stuff did you do?”

“I called my parents every Sunday. I went to the gym every Monday and Thursday night, had four hash browns and eggs for breakfast on Saturday because that’s what my dad used to make, stuff like that. I also put aside every Saturday to go out and discover things about the city. Made me feel less like a stranger, y’know?”

Mina contemplated Sasha’s words in silence. “A routine, huh? I can do that.”

“You’re Catholic, aren’t you? Do you go to church often?”

“Yeah, I used to go every week on a Saturday night.”

“Maybe you could look for churches around here with Saturday night services? Join a youth group or something? And you love to swim so maybe you can find a beach or a pool nearby?”

“Rico also said I could decorate my little room however I wanted as long as everything could be dismantled quickly and easily. I think I might do that. Keep my mind off it and make this place a little more familiar.” Mina waved her hand vaguely in the direction of the sleeping quarters. “It’s just all grey and metal right now.”

“That sounds like a great idea!” Sasha beamed. “And hey, remember that if you ever wanna talk or hang out or go out or anything, I’m always here. If you ever want to go out and explore the city then I am more than happy to go with you. We’re the new ones here, yeah? Gotta stick together.”

Mina smiled and bumped the top of her head against Sasha’s cheek. “Thanks, it really means a lot right now.”

“No problem, friend.”

“Where was your favourite place that you discovered?”

“There’s a few SkyZones around the city and I loved those. Used to spend hours there.”

“I’ve never actually been to one before.”

Sasha looked horrified. “What? Oh no, we are going to fix that as soon as we can. That’s the first place we’re going.”

Mina nodded, flicking her fingers and the tears once again evaporated off her skin. “I’m looking forward to it already.”

“Just tell me when, and we’ll go.”

“Thanks for this.”

“No worries friendo.” They both sat on there in silence, Sasha continuing to rub soothing circles on Mina’s arm and the younger woman closed her eyes, very thankful for the companionship that Sasha was offering. After a while, she rubbed her eyes and sniffed, finally lifting her head to smile at Sasha. “Do you want to maybe watch some Avatar with me? The Last Airbender, not the movie.”

“Sure! What are you up to?”

“Well I’m about to start the second book.” second book

“You watched a whole book in a day?”

“The episodes aren’t long! And it’s good so I couldn’t help it.”

Sasha waved her hand dismissively. “Nah, I’m not judging. I watch entire seasons of TV shows in one sitting so I can’t judge.”

“I still have to set things up so you have time to go get a drink or something.”

“Sure, kind of feel like tea right now. I’ll be back in a sec!”

Leaping from her seat and out the door, she almost barged right into Annie as she zipped out of the lounge room. “Whoops, sorry!” Sasha threw over her shoulder.

“It’s alright!” Annie called. Looking at the door of the living room thoughtfully, she tapped her chin twice before setting off downstairs.

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, 1422 HOURS, 14TH JANUARY 2012**

“What’s with the bars?”

Both Rico and Annie jumped at the sound of the voice and swore under their breath when she recognised it. “Ah well, they’re um…” Annie stammered. “Ah, fuck it, no point hiding it now. They’re for you, actually.”

“For me?”

“Mm hmm. I have an floor exercise mat as well but I didn’t have time to set it up before you came down here.”

“For training?”

“Partly.” Rico answered. “Gymnastics is an excellent way to maintain and improve fitness, flexibility, endurance, all that sort of thing. You’ve already got this particular set of skills so why not utilise them? Plus, you enjoy this immensely so this is working out in a fun way.”

“And I… accidentally overheard a little bit of your conversation with Sasha the other night, so know you’ve been a little homesick. I thought maybe doing something familiar might help.” Annie admitted sheepishly.

Mina, touched by Annie’s thoughtfulness, stepped forwards and wrapped her arms around Annie’s waist. Annie flailed her arms around for a few seconds before patting Mina’s shoulder.

“Thank you.” Mina said, voice muffled by her comrade’s shoulder. Annie patted her back a few more times and smiled.

“No problem. I just hope you enjoy them. And we completely forgot about the chalk bowl until around half an hour ago and the tumbling spring track will be here in a few days. And I know you do all of them so I did some googling and if you want we can also get a balance beam, a vault and a small trampoline. If you want a block or something you can just take one of the spare parkour ones.”

Mina stepped back and wiped her eyes. “I’ll think about it. Thank you.” She gestured to the bars and mat a few paces away from them. “Can I help you two set them up?”

“Of course. You probably know how to do that better than we do.”

With the three working together, the bars and floor mat was set up in no time at all and Mina set to work unboxing the chalk.

“You know, I kind of did gymnastics once. Kind of.” Rico mused.

Mina paused her motions and looked at the healer with a slightly skeptical expression. “Really?”

“Yeah, for a little over six months when I was thirteen.”

“Didn’t like it?”

“It was fun, but it just wasn’t my kind of thing.” They shrugged. “You though, I hear you’re quite good. Won competitions and everything.”

Mina shuffled her feet, looking bashful. “Yeah."

“Mind showing me some tricks?”

At that question, Mina’s entire face lit up. “Sure! Just let me get changed into something else and get my grips.”

“Mind if you have an audience?”

“Of course not!”

**FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER**

“So swimming’s a bit obvious but how did you get into gymnastics?” Christa asked curiously as she sat down cross legged on the floor, ready to enjoy the show.

Mina sat down now, taking a moment to stretch to her toes before answering. "I was 5 at a school fair with my mom, and I saw a gymnast do a basic pike to half twist and younger me thought 'I wanna be like her when I'm older.' Mum signed me up there and then. Twelve years later, I'm a championship gymnast. Could’ve made a career out of it but I wanted to study instead."

“Gymnasts are hardcore, man. Mad respect.” Ymir said, tapping her fist against her chest. “Never know how you can manage to do any of the stuff you do without snapping your spine in half or breaking a leg clean off.”

This drew a short laugh from Mina. “It’s the flow of the sport, it’s all in the mind because you’re defying all logic, kind of.”

“How so?” Mikasa asked.

“Well, why walk to the other corner of that mat when you can run really fast and do triple twisting double back instead?”

“I got no clue what it is but it sounds difficult. Back breakingly difficult.”

“I will show you when I’m a little more warmed up then.”

“What is the most serious injury you’ve had?” Hanji asked, pulling a pen and tattered notebook from their pockets.

“I fell off the uneven bars a few years back and dislocated my shoulder. I haven’t torn or broken anything yet and I hope I never do.” Mina took the time to stand and stretch her entire body towards the ceiling for a moment. “Alright! All ready to go! I think I’ll go with floor first.”

“What are you going to do first?”

“Hmm, I’ll start off easy so… one and a half twist into a full twist? Yeah!”

“Well we have no idea what that is so go ahead and show us!”

Mina stepped onto the mat and bounced on her toes. “Oh, this floor is springy!”

“Is that a good thing?”

“Yep! Better a bouncy floor than a dead one. Saves on my ankles.” With that, Mina bounced once more on her toes before sprinting forwards. About halfway along the mat, Mina vaulted into a roundoff backhandspring and twisted tightly in the air before coming back down. Her feet touched the floor and she immediately sprung up into the air again, executing another tight twist in the air before landing perfectly on the floor.

The spectators all let out a loud cheer and began to clap enthusiastically, causing Mina to duck her head and smile.

“That was easy?” Petra asked.

Mina nodded, and Petra let out a low whistle. “That’s already impressive. Well done!”

“I’ve only just started!” And with that, Mina sprinted and tumbled her way across the mat again, laughing and bowing exaggeratedly as the spectators let out similar sounds of awe and cheered, applauding loudly.

“Now I get why you are so solid everywhere.” Christa commented, making everyone laugh.

“Holy shit, that was awesome!” Ymir exclaimed.

Mina smiled radiantly. “Thank you! It was the first pass for one of my performances in a competition.”

“How did you end up going in that?”

“I won. It was tough though, all the other competitors were so good and I only won by like, 0.02 points.”

“That was good, but it  was so quick that I missed half of it.” Hanji lamented, so Mina backed up into the corner and tumbled her way across the mat again. Everybody cheered again and Hanji was frantically scribbling notes but Rico stayed silent, head tilted to the side in contemplation. “Mina, can you please repeat that last one?”

Mina did as she was asked and Rico’s eyebrows rose. “You think you can add in a kick as you’re coming down to the ground?”

“Why?”

“Because I’ve been thinking about how to teach you how to defend yourself, but seeing you do this has given me an idea. In fact--” The weaponmaster jogged onto the mat and stood few paces away from Mina. “I want you to do that motion again but this time, kick me before you land.”

“What?”

“Trust me on this, I just want to see.”

Still looking highly confused, Mina retreated a distance away and came at Rico again, executing the move but before she landed, she extended her leg and brought her foot smashing down on top of Rico’s head. Rico staggered backwards, trying to blink away stars across their field of vision while Mina stumbled on her landing. Rico’s head pounded and in their disoriented state, almost fell over but Annie rushed forwards to catch them.

“Satisfied with the result?” She asked as Rico leaned on her heavily.

Rico held up a finger and squeezed their eyes shut briefly, feeling the pain and dizziness ebb away quickly before opening their eyes. “That was perfect, actually.”

“You want Mina to do twist-a-shits while defending herself?” Ymir asked incredulously.

“Not like this, of course. But we can apply some of these moves and concepts to her self defence training and build on them. Start on something familiar.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, 1007 HOURS, 17TH JANUARY 2012**

“Oh good, you are here.”

“Hello to you, Ymir.” Mikasa replied dryly, continuing to tinker away at the car.  “Why were you looking for me?”

“I wanted to talk to you.” Ymir eyed the mass of tools and part spread out next to the car. “But uh, I can come back later if you want.”

Setting down her tools carefully, Mikasa wiped her hands a cloth and sat down on a nearby bench. “No, now’s fine. What’s up?”

“So… what’s your deal with fire?”

Ymir didn’t miss the way Mikasa’s entire body stiffened uncomfortably. Feeling more awkward as the silence stretched on, she opened her mouth to retract her question when Mikasa answered in a quiet voice.

“House fire. It’s where I lost my parents.”

Ymir's mouth formed a small O. So much for a tactful approach.

"Look, here's the thing. We're going to struggle as super awesome vigilantes protecting the innocent if I can't get into cars without a strong enough incentive and your fear of fire. So how about we cut to the fuckin' chase and we team up to sort that shit out."

"How much of that was Christa's words?"

Ymir shrugged. "About 97% of it."

Mikasa nodded slowly and put down the wrench she was holding. “It’s a good idea.”

“We’re on the same page then. So, how you wanna do this shit?”

“I was actually thinking about this last night and I think I know how to help you.”

“You wanna tell me or are you gonna make me guess?”

“I’m going to teach you how to drive.”

Ymir’s entire face drained of colour and seeing this, Mikasa quickly jumped to reassure her. “Don’t worry, I’ll be right beside you the entire time and I’ll have a brake on my side of the car so I can jump in whenever and if I need to.”

Ymir still looked utterly terrified, so Mikasa continued. “You don’t have to start off driving first. We can just go for drives for a while before moving onto the lessons. I’ll give you a crash helmet if you want one. I’ll even install one of those racing harnesses on the driver’s seat if it’ll make you feel better at first."

Ymir licked her dry lips before answering. “I want that helmet.”

Mikasa held up her hands. “Done.”

Ymir huffed out a short relieved breath, look substantially less panicked now they had finished discussing it. “Alright, what are we gonna do for you? I can’t even sit next to you and play with a small fire on my fingers without you going all white and shit. Might have to start small for you.”

Hitching up her pants, Ymir took a seat next to Mikasa on the low bench and rubbed her thumb and index finger together. The spark and small flame that appeared made Mikasa flinch visibly.

“We might as well start off with me just playing around with a small fire while you sit next to me and watch.”

“Now?”

“I can do this all day if I need to. You got time now?”

Mikasa glanced over at the sea of car parts and thought about the prospect of having to replace almost all the parts under the hood. “Yeah, I have time now.”

“Cool.” Ymir clicked her fingers again and threw the flame into the air, and Mikasa watched in both fear and curiosity as the flame warped into a sphere when it came in contact with Ymir’s skin. “Let’s start then.”

**BASE OF OPERATIONS, 2236 HOURS, 22ND JANUARY 2012**

“Ah, Zara! Just the person I wanted to see!”

Zara, who had sock-surfed out of the kitchen area, sailed right past them and performed an elaborate spin to face her comrade. “What you need me for?”

Hanji waved the thick wad of paper that Zara had dropped into their lab this morning. “This project you’re proposing, it’s... very ambitious.”

“Which is why I want to start planning now. It’s going to take at least a few years if I’m doing this on my own.”

“Well, I have some questions about it first but it seems like a good idea. For now.”

Zara beamed. “Great! Oh! I had stuff to tell you too.”

Hanji inclined their head, which Zara took as an invitation to continue. “Two things. First, I am not buying C4 for you because I do not want to deal with whatever you’re going to do with it. Secondly, I found another two people and Petra has already confirmed that she has seen them before. Sound manipulation and teleportation.”

“Is Petra still doing the introductions?”

“She’s already working on it.”


End file.
